


AQUARIUS

by CoffeeMilkAndTea



Category: Banana Fish (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Anime spoilers will be indicated in the tags, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Child Soldiers, Drama/Thriller, Eiji’s struggle is so real, Ending Compliant but it’s a fix it, Episode 9 spoilers, Fix-It, Greek Mythology - Freeform, Hold on to your seat belts this is gonna be a r i d e, Human Experimentation, M/M, NO SPOILERS IN SUMMARY, OC side characters for worldbuilding, POC heavy, Reincarnation, Reincarnation AU, Sci-Fi, Set after the Manga finishes, Sort Of, Spoilers, Symptoms of PTSD, Tags will be edited as necessary, Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego-I mean Ash Lynx, Worldbuilding, au sequel, kid geniuses
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-22
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-06-30 21:44:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 29,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15760299
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CoffeeMilkAndTea/pseuds/CoffeeMilkAndTea
Summary: Gods only exist in the minds of men.In 1997, Eiji Okemura is born back into the world. Plagued by a mysterious entity named “CORE,” he attempts to navigate the new age, while trying to reach the remnants of his past- and find Ash Lynx.





	1. Prologue, Part One: Hope is the pillar that holds up the world. Hope is the dream of a waking man.

In the year of 1997, in a small hospital in the suburbs of Chicago, a reincarnated soul is born back into the world to immigrant parents Aiko and Yuki Nakamura, both tired after a long week at the hospital, but thrilled to welcome their first child.

By some mysterious turn of fate, they name him Eiji- Again.

“Why won’t he stop crying?” Aiko asks the nurse, a little desperate, weary after a long labor. Her husband hovered over them both, like a particularly worried bird, breaking from the endless pacing he did- a habit of his, whenever there was a need to come up with solutions. 

They’d been trying everything within the last 24 hours, shortly after Eiji had been birthed. Feeding him did nothing, along with every other idea- all useless. 

Meanwhile, Eiji wailed on, blinded by the bright lights, the sharp smell of sanitation alcohol, his mind flush with memories that would make little sense to anyone present.

( _Ash smiling at him-Ah, the sound of gunfire was echoing all around them in the sewers as they were being hunted down, like animals by the group of mercenaries- Ash’s face, tight with tension as he watched his boys bandage up Eiji from the gunshot from the window)_

Eiji wailed on. And on.

•

_Six years later, in the year 2003:_

•

A knock raps smartly at the door: and in her surprise, Aiko nearly burns herself on the hot oven while peeking at the chicken, which was turning a sizzling, golden brown; the scent of fat and herbs filled the kitchen, and her stomach growled. She ignored it “Coming!” She calls, distracted. A bit early for them to be home, she thinks to herself.

 

It was summer, and the day of their anniversary- cicadas were beginning their song outside, her husband and Eiji were playing in the water sprinklers going off at the park before dinner, while she prepared food at home- her husband usually cooked for special occasions, but just this once, she thought she’d surprise him.

 

Opening the door, expecting a tired husband and her happy child, she is wholly unprepared for the sight of Eiji’s teacher from Elementary School, who stands there, fist ready to knock again. Aiko stood there staring at the other woman, momentarily struck dumb with shock. Then panic begins to set in.

Eiji was a model student in elementary school, according to every source she’d heard, Aiko thinks, mind racing as she stood there, mute. Very polite, if a little distant-seeming at times from other children, but mostly liked by classmates and teachers. Never really in trouble, (a little unusual for a six year old perhaps, but she wasn’t about to complain or look a gift horse in the mouth) and certainly not enough to bring a teacher to her door over the summer.

“...Mrs. Hastings?” She ventured, recovering from the initial shock. “How are you? What brings you here?”

The motherly-looking blonde woman smiled faintly at her, well-loved laughter lines lifting and eyes crinkling. “Hello, Aiko. I wanted to talk to you about your son. I hope I’m not intruding- I’ll only take a moment of your time.”

“No, not at all. Please, come in.” But by the time she had served tea for them both, Aiko‘s stomach was tense with anticipation, a looming feeling of anxiety weighing down her back.

She sat nervously at the table, and watched as Mrs. Hastings drank, unable to drink, her stomach twisting in knots.

When Hastings set down her cup on the table with a business-like clunk, it made Aiko flinch.

Unaware-or uncaring of the other woman’s tenseness, the teacher folded her hands together, elbows on the table, partially obscuring her face with her hands. Blue eyes, surrounded by fine lines seemed to observe Aiko shrewdly.

“I’ll be quite blunt with you, Mrs. Nakamura. Your son hides it pretty well from his peers, but I’m quite sure that he’s a genius- to the point where I’m not sure if he belongs in elementary school any longer, or even middle school.”

Aiko felt her jaw unhinge, and silence followed. 

“Wh-what do you mean?” She stammered, at last, feeling rather like she’d been slapped with a fish.

Hasting‘s gaze turned from expectant to incredulous. “You...” the teacher sat back in her chair. “I’ve never heard of that before,” she said, almost to herself. “You’re totally surprised.” They sat in mutual silence for a moment.

Distantly, Aiko wondered if his teacher thought she was a bad mother for not knowing what her son did. Hell, _she_ wondered if she was a bad mother.

“He’s been going to the library every week, you know,” Mrs. Hasting’s voice bringing her back to reality. “I’ve been seeing him with a giant stack of books on advanced computer programming and mathematics, sometimes with a friend to help him carry them, using the computer with no adult help at all.”

“What?” Aiko almost-shrieked, then covered her mouth. Her mother would probably be horrified. Teachers were owed _respect_.

“Oh my.” Hastings began to look worried. “... I don’t quite know what to say,” she offered, after a long pause in the second, stunned silence. “But I will tell you I’m happy to help you and your son. I think you should talk to him. And maybe you should start keeping some books for him to read.”

“Right,” Aiko said, dazed.

•

The summer passed by in a blur of library trips, long talks about the future, and peaceful happiness.

Aiko had been feeling increasingly distant from her son- the older he got, the more independent he had become. But she was always blisteringly proud of him, and loved him with everything she had- she had thought before it wasn’t possible to love anyone more than her husband- but she was proved wrong. Her smiling, solemnly kind boy with the rocket scientist brain.

It was definitely- strange. That was a good word to use. She had determined, after her parents had been so hard-lined on her own education, that whatever child she had would be simply supported and loved for the child that it was- never to take education for granted, but still.

She had no idea at the time where that approach would take her, or if it was even a good one, but when she looked at her little boy hungrily devouring one archived National Geographic magazine after the other for pleasure _-for pleasure_! she felt satisfied.

•

Eiji sighed, looking at another stack of books. Every available surface on his walls were plastered with this or that, world maps-printouts of news articles- his mother had no idea what to think about it whenever she saw it (he could see it on her face) and...he felt that.

Most days he actually didn’t know what to think about it, either; just that he wanted to do something to... find out if his past life was real, that he wasn’t crazy, and if he wasn’t crazy- oh, _Ash_. Reading history in old newspapers comforted him a little, when he read events that he remembered.

His best chance of finding out things was likely finding Sing again, not-so-little Sing; Eiji wondered if he was okay.

The chances of Ash being reincarnated along with him, Eiji were astronomically small. And yet... Eiji just couldn’t really leave it alone; he was afraid to. Just knowing Ash’s luck, he could find himself in deep water _again_.

There was a chance that Eiji might not be able to help him (if that was the case) while he searched, but damn if he wasn’t going to be there as soon as he could.

He had no idea how he was going to find him, but just the thought of history partially repeating itself was enough to keep him awake at night. He really hated Dino Gonzales- and every man like him in the world.

Eiji prayed, each time that Ash, if alive would be left alone, left to grow up with the peace he so longed for when he was alive. More bitterly, he prayed for the souls of each child like Ash.

Oh, but Ash probably would of had a better idea of how to deal with the situation he was in, Eiji felt, with a sudden and keen sense of desperation. He was the real genius, between the two of them. He felt like a cheater.

Tiredly, he cracked open the book. It was “The Dummy’s Introduction to Stock Market Exchange,” which honestly, sounded perfect for someone like him. Smiling to himself, rubbed the grit from his eyes and read in earnest.

Well, if he was going to catch up to Ash Lynx some day, he’d better be prepared to make some cash. And fly to New York City.

•

On a blistering day in late July, Eiji came home, tired and hungry from playing with the neighborhood boys. It was sunset, not quite yet time to eat dinner, because his dad hadn’t come home from work- but he was going to try beg a snack from his mom, and feeling rather hopeful about it when he reached for the doorknob.

It turned in his hand with no resistance.

Every sense in him sharpened.

( _Battered chairs, bullet holes in the apartment walls- the concerned eyes of friends as he bandaged himself)_

Cautiously, quietly he eased the door open.

He was hitting his first growth spurt, so he wasn’t as small as he used to be; and he was carrying a small ball that he’d previously brought to the game. It wasn’t quite the weapon he’d wish for, but it might be a useful distraction. He crept carefully, trying to remain silent.

The sound of the radio was blaring, overly loud- enough that their neighbors could complain. There was a creeping feeling of panic tickling his throat.

 _(Momsmiling, momlookingdeterminedwithastackofmagazines_ )

When he turned the corner, he was met with the sight of his mother lying face down on the kitchen table, blood pooling around her head and slowly beginning to drip down the legs and onto the lime-green carpet floor.

She is horribly still, and Eiji vomits all over his shoes, bile seeping through his blue sneakers and into his socks. 

He vaguely remembers sprinting out of the house, pelting down the street to use the pay phone; their landline had expired a few months ago, money being used to further his education. He’d been so touched by their sacrifice at the time, he couldn’t even speak.

His feet ache by the time he reaches the box. Eiji, with trembling hands reaches down into his pocket for a few quarters- (just this morning, his mother had given them to him to buy candy for his friends) and plugs them in, punching in 911. The dial tone purrs.

In another life when he called the police, he was bleeding out in the streets of New York, and had just met Ash Lynx. This was rather different, he felt; He stares at a stray piece of wadded gum on the phone pole, trying very hard not to cry.

Eiji felt lost- he might be living his second life, but he is six years old all over again, living peaceful life in American surburbia, and he loves his mother, so much.

“911, police, fire or ambulance?” He hears, a woman’s voice and tries not to break down.

He chokes out, “My mom’s dead.”

The rest is a blur.


	2. Prologue, Part Two: To Thine Self Be True

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Having lost both parents in one fell swoop, Eiji is left to the tender mercies of the powers that be and the state.

Eiji feels numb as he sits in the cold, impersonal lounge of the police’s office, clutching at an empty cone of water. They’d given him a Mylar blanket for shock, the silvery stuff crinkling around him with every move he made.

The office is very different than the warm sepia of the one he’d seen in New York City, all shades of beige and brown leather and full of the smell of cigarettes, papers askew everywhere, half-written chalkboards.

The carpet is some bizarre mix of green and black, as far as he can tell, with some pink and blue rolled in. It’s very well used, the common areas beaten in and black, and the lights above were fluorescent and very white, making him think of prison.

 

But it doesn’t matter. None of it mattered.

Aiko was a kind mother- she had been _good_ to Eiji, had tried to understand him as best she could. 

And Eiji thinks of his father- coming home every day, ready with a tired smile and a kiss for his wife, still terribly in love and happy. He hopes that they’ll be able to reach him soon, but he dreads finding out what the news would do to his father. Would he become a shell of a man, empty and soulless? Would he soldier on? 

There are hushed voices in the next room- the walls were thin here.

Despite himself, Eiji listens.

 

“The kid’s dad was found shot dead in the bathroom stall where he worked! Just how the fuck do you think we should break it to this kid?” One gruff voice breaks through, audible.

The receptionist hears. She pauses mid-paperwork to stare at it in horror, then at Eiji.

 

Oh.

 

... _Oh_.

 

He feels like he’s been punched in the gut. Tears began streaming down Eiji’s face. Desperately, horribly alone, Eiji drew his knees up to his chest and sobbed.

 

 _Dad_.

 

•

 

Days melt into other days. He gets shuffled between the hospital and the police office, a little person connected to two strange deaths in a perfectly ordinary suburb. He could care less. Solving the case wouldn’t bring them back, after all. He wasn’t someone who had revenge built into their bones. Resentment, maybe. But not revenge.

The Ash he knew might’ve been able to hold it together- but he’s not Ash. No one else was Ash, but Ash. 

(Sometimes, in his past life he tried to talk himself into believing that he was fine with it. Sometimes he did believe it.)

 

Lost in his own thoughts, he barely registers the person walking up to him- a severe-looking woman with old, dowdy looking clothes that could of once been fashionable, but not for thirty years at least. She extends a hand in greeting to him. “Hello, my name is Norma Jean.”

Somewhere past the haze of grief, something tickles at the back of his mind as he stares at the hand of the social worker. It’s a little scarred, but mostly well-taken care of and somewhat plump. There’s no ring on the finger, nor any tan line signifying she ever wore one.

 

Norma Jean... where has he heard that...?

 

He hesitantly shakes the hand, unable to put off contact for much longer. It smells, oddly like antiseptic. Maybe hand sanitizer? Strange. “I’m Eiji,” he whispers.

It’s been a long five days, and he feels exhausted beyond belief. Between losing his mother and father all in one fell swoop to unknown assailants, he had been feeling like he had nowhere to turn, nowhere to go- and broken hearted all over again.

He’d experienced grief before, but despite the many occasions he had felt it- it never got better. It never became easier. He would never have the support and encouragement of his mother ever again, as misguided as it sometimes felt when she talked to him, or the soft-heartedness of his father.

And lastly, flying to New York and finding his past was always a long term goal, but now it felt as distant as the moon.

 

But the woman’s severe features are attempting to look kind, and he appreciates that, at least. “I’m here on behalf of CORE for Kids, and your teacher, Mrs. Hastings tells me that you’re something of a prodigy?” He squirms uncomfortably. This is a line of questioning that he never felt comfortable with, but- “I’d like you to take a test, if you don’t mind?”

Without much ado, pen and paper is set down in front of him. The woman gives, what apparently is her best shot at smiling kindly. It’s not an ill-intentioned attempt, from what he can tell.But he’s not entirely sure about her true intentions, either.

He picks it up and begins studying it.

•

After about ten minutes, he finishes the last page of the test, startled by how easy it was. It wasn’t so bad, certainly a bit more difficult than his school tests, but not harder than those books he would read from the library.

“Thank you! Would you like some juice or water?” She sounded positively cheerful.

He accepts water, and wonders.

Norma Jean...

Where was that name from again? It wasn’t someone from his past life, but it sure sounded familiar.

•

“So you’ll be going with CORE, kid.” The portly chief of police waved his pen at Eiji. He smells of cigarette smoke, but overall Eiji thinks that he’s a rather kind person. He has two children, with their pictures framed on his desk. “The state’s ruled that for the interim, someone like you should be taken care of by someone who understands that you’re a brainiac.”

What could Eiji say? “Yes sir,” he whispers.

Warm brown eyes survey Eiji, then soften. “I’m sorry for your loss, kid. Your parents sounded like good people.”

Eiji feels a few tears escape, despite his best efforts. “Yeah,” he chokes out, after a few moments.

“You act like you’re twice your age. I’ve never seen a six year old act like you, Eiji. I hope everything works out for you over at that center.” Reaching out, he ruffles Eiji’s stick-straight hair and with his other hand, a little awkwardly, sticks his other hand into his pocket and pulls out a card. “In case you ever need me, here’s my card.” He presses it into Eiji’s hand, warm brown skin covering his own, then sits back heavily into his leather chair.

 

Eiji’s reminded, a little of another African man, full of gruff kindness and straightforward practicality. They’re not the same person by any means, and they were surely on two different sides of the law, but he’s reminded all the same.

 

“People of color gotta look out for one another. It’s a damn cold world out there. You’re too young to understand, maybe and hopefully they take care of you, but you ever in trouble, just hold onto that card and call me.”

“No, Mr. Forth. I understand.” Eiji wipes at the remnants of his tears, and attempts to smile. “Thank you.”

Forth smiles at Eiji, too. “Son, you’re a good kid.” 

•

Eiji’s not sure what to make of... pretty much all of it. He’s allowed a small suitcase of whatever he wants to go with him to the centre, and apparently CORE is located somewhere in Chicago city proper. He hasn’t seen a city proper in a while, and he’s never been to Chicago, so...

He’s not excited, exactly, but he’s _interested_.

 

CORE sends a different worker than the woman, this time to take him. He’s very tall, and speaks with a light Cantonese accent. Eiji feels that he’s much better at children, even for grieving children like himself. “Hey, Kiddo. Didja pack everything?” Eiji nods, and it earns him a head ruffle. “I know everything must be scary for you. I’m sorry about your parents.” People keep saying that, and some of them seem to even mean it. This guy seems to mean it, or is pretty decent at looking like he cares. “I hear that you’re pretty smart. What’s your favorite subject?”

It probably doesn’t really matter if he answers, but Eiji does anyway. It distracts from the weight in his chest. “History.”

“History, huh?” The man smiles, and lifts Eiji’s carry-on for him. He holds out his hand for Eiji to take, and they walk to the car. “What’s so cool about history?”

 

“I forgot to ask you your name,” Eiji replies, instead of answering. He probably couldn’t say that it made him feel less crazy for remembering a past life.

 

“Oh! My name’s Choek-Ying. But you can call me Fir, if you want.”

 

 _Churk-Ying_ , Eiji mentally tries the pronunciation. “My name’s Eiji. It’s nice to meet you, Choek-Ying.” Choek-Ying chuckles, then pops the trunk to load Eiji’s suitcase. “Hey, pretty good handle on the accent. Anyone teach you Cantonese?”

Teach? No. But he’d been surrounded by those boys for a lifetime, or sometimes it felt like it.

It was bittersweet that some things were so stuck to you that it could follow you to another life. Eiji shook his head, and Cheok-Ying took it for a negative. “Well, I’d offer to teach you some Cantonese, but I got no idea what kinda curriculum they’re gonna be offering you.” He commented cheerfully. “C’mon, get in the car.”

Eiji is strapped into a child seat in the back, and with that, the social worker starts the car. “So, Kiddo do you listen to music?” 

Eiji is struck by how ridiculous it sounds to ask a six year old if they listened to music, even a.. genius six year old.

Ash used to listen to whatever was on the radio, but he liked German pop songs and more rock-sounding pop. Eiji’s taste grew to be the same, after learning that. Sing’s grew up to be Heavy Metal, and Yut-Lung always had some fancy classical music playing, something Ash would of hated... probably because of Dino. Although, he’s not sure that Ash would of enjoyed listening to dead musicians, no matter what. Dead people were just that- dead.

 

So Eiji just shrugs, and Cheok-Ying turns on the radio, and a young woman sadly wails; 

_Can I sail through the changing ocean tides, can I handle the seasons of my life..._

•

When they arrive in Chicago, Eiji’s startled, at first by the similarities-and yet- not to New York City. It’s sidewalks are just as dirty, just as covered in litter, but somehow, it’s quieter. New York was always a thousand horns blaring, a few hundred pigeons and a whole lot of people cursing each other out. Eiji had loved it. It was very different from where he had grown up-both lifetimes.

Chicago is not like New York, in that respect. But it’s not like Los Angeles, either.

They don’t stop at any particular place. There’s no sign saying “CORE,” on any of the buildings, although to be honest, Eiji couldn’t really imagine such a thing.

 

But when Cheok-Ying enters the Chicago Airport...

 

Though he does his best to hide it, Eiji is alarmed as he climbs out, mud-stained shoes touching gravel. There are families all around him, all busy with their individual lives- saying goodbye to their fathers, their kids-

“Come on, kid.” Cheok-Ying barely spares him a glance as he lifts their luggage onto the curb- _their_ luggage, plural. He hadn’t gotten a good look at the trunk earlier, nor had anyone else, when they left. The police force had washed their hands of him after ensuring his custody, and why shouldn’t they? But...

 

“They said that we’d- That CORE is located in Chicago.” Eiji stammers, immediately regretting saying anything. Internally, he was already planning escape routes. An airport busy as this, there’s bound to be some way... probably.

 

But there’s one issue. He is _six years old_.

And there’s a _lot_ in the way of human trafficking for little kids- knowledge he wishes that he didn’t have, but knowledge he has nonetheless. CORE might be who they say they are, but there’s no guarantee of his safety if he leaves.

“Hm?” Cheok-Ying hums, absent-mindedly. “What? Oh, we have an office here, but that’s not where the centre is.”

 

Eiji does not relax.

But he goes with Cheok-Ying.

•

 

Apparently their destination is Dullas Airport, Virginia.

All Eiji knows about the area is that Washington D.C. and the CIA are located near it, and that’s about it.

He could not be further away from NYC if he tried.

 

Feeling depressed, but feeling like he owes it to himself to try: when he and Cheok-Ying are situated in their seats on the plane, he ventures, “So... what’s the centre like?” 

Cheok-Ying launches into a spiel that sounds suspiciously like something you’d read in a pamphlet. Eiji does not trust a single word of it, and stops listening a few minutes in, abandoning the information as a bad job.

Ash would of escaped at the airport, he thinks to himself, glumly. Or the Ash he knew would of, anyway. But the Ash he knew had friends and allies to back him up.

 

When Cheok-Ying pauses for breath, ten minutes after the plane lifted off for departure, he eyes Eiji. “You know, I’ve helped many a genius kid here and there, but you’re definitely up there. Your grasp on language and everything are really something else- are you sure that you’re not a shrunken adult or something?” He smiles, eyes crinkling to let Eiji know that he’s kidding.

This does rather the opposite effect of making Eiji relax, but Eiji, after a lifetime’s worth of trying to make people believe that he was okay, knows how to act.

•

 

“We’re here,” Cheok-Ying sings out, hauling out Eiji’s suitcase, probably for the last time. Eiji didn’t try to make a break for it at the Dullas Airport, either- it was huge and Eiji, perhaps hard-headedly, was determined to see it through. Maybe CORE was what it said it was, maybe it wasn’t.

Eiji unbuckled himself from his child seat, and got out.

A cold white building loomed before him. As he had thought, there was no sign advertising it’s presence. But now that thought felt cold and sinister, like the rest of it.

 

 _Ash, if you’re out there- please wait a little longer._ Eiji thinks- or prays.

 

He follows Cheok-Ying inside.

 


	3. Volume One, Part One

_Somewhere in Virginia, The Year 2004, One Year later:_

_Wheeze. Wheeze. Wheeze._

Eiji sprints through the dark forest, stray branches whipping across his chest and arm, leaving thin cuts. His mouth felt dry; every breath he took was agonizing.

“Come here, _Chink_!” A voice taunted from behind him, and he ran ever faster. He needed-! Ah!

He shoves his handgun into his holster, and hastily began to shimmy up the tree, ignoring how his hands burned at the rough contact, how his pants tore and when they did, abraded the flesh beneath. He climbed for as long as he felt was safe, listening for the sound of taunting behind him.

When he is halfway up in the branches, the sound of taunting paused, for his tormentors were located right underneath his tree.

“Where’d he go?”

“I dunno, Arthur- You’re captain, you tell _me!_ ”

 Trying to control his breathing, heart racing Eiji pulls out his headset and peers through the night goggles. There they were, red-and-orange blobs. He didn’t have very much time, he thinks and pulls out his handgun. It wasn’t as accurate as a rifle, but it was more than good enough for his purposes. 

He aims.

•

_2003:_

“This is Doctor Firenze,” Cheok-Ying introduces Eiji, who is starting to shiver with nerves and can’t help it. He squeezes Eiji’s shoulder. It doesn’t help; Eiji is starting to regret not escaping, though it’s much too late now.

But the doctor offers no pleasantries, and seems to not expect them from Eij. Eiji’s not sure if he could of mustered it if he tried. “Alright Nakamura, shirt off. We’re doing an examination.” 

“Don’t you have my medical history?” Eiji bravely ventures, but is silenced with a stony look from the doctor. Cheok-Ying attempts to look reassuring. “Just go with it, kiddo.” Eiji’s mouth tightens.

Eiji is subjected to all sorts of treatment for quite a while; they take several blood samples, inject him with things that Cheok-Ying assures him are just routine vaccines; Eiji highly doubts it, but endured it. He hopes none of them would kill him, and imagines Ash and his mother, both yelling at the two adults. It doesn’t help, but it makes him feel better.

The infirmary, when he looks around is cream-and-grey, dreary and freezing, smelling like a hospital. It’s sparsely finished, and there’s a line of beds with curtains. Eiji wonders if they had any inhabitants; the layout reminds him of school in his original hometown, Izumo; but in this place, it only seemed vaguely sinister.

Then came: “Get on that treadmill.”

 

“What?” Eiji asks, startled. He’s  _never_ heard of a regular doctor making physical exercise part of an examination for _six_ year olds. They’re not even _trying_ for subtlety, aren’t they? Eiji thinks, then with a rush, feels depressed. Of course they’re not, why would they bother? No one knew where he was, and for all intents and purposes, they had total power over him- not like they’d have to pretend for a six year old. Lost in thought, he barely notices Cheok-Ying reaching out to grab for his wrist.

“You heard the doc, Eiji. C’mon, buddy, let’s go to the treadmill.” Eiji hates Cheok-Ying right then as he’s pulling Eiji, but he puts up no fuss, climbs on the treadmill and waits. “All right, Eiji- I need you to do something for me: Can you play this game while you run?” 

What? 

Cheok-Ying turns on the screen on the treadmill; it appears to be some kind of trivia game. 

Eiji breathes in. It looks ridiculous. He feels like a circus monkey being asked to do tricks.

The white letters on the black screen flash at him tauntingly on the treadmill.  Game Start, it read in lowercase.

Breathes out. You’ll get through this, he tells himself. You’ll survive whatever comes at you and take a one-way ticket to New York. 

•

_2004, One Year Later:_

Eiji jumps from branch to branch in the treetops, nearly silent. He’d left his opponents for dead; and judging from the radio silence from his teammates, he had been forgotten once again.

The other children that arrived over the past year had quickly made their own friend groups upon arrival, and he’d arrived at a slow time in enrollment. If he had tried though, he’s sure he could of befriended them.

It’s just that... he couldn’t bring himself to. 

Memories of his mother’s lifeless corpse would keep him up at night, leaving him pale and zombie-like in the morning. It was all he could do to keep up with the workload, in the beginning. Not that he was alone in that; CORE seemed to delight in wringing the youngest of them dry. Three children that he knew of had fainted from the stress of the workload alone. 

It was a small comfort that CORE seemed to be, for the most part, exactly what it said. However, there were things that he still had questions for: a few months after beginning his “introductory course,” firearm training was _mandatory_. And once a week, his fellow children would be called in to do medical testing.

And this- game, though it was presented to the children as one, felt anything but. But Eiji, as ever felt he that he had no choice in the matter.

Eiji decided to try call in. “Alpha Two-Six, come in.” They were smart seven year olds, to be sure, but they were still seven. Their teamwork left something to be desired; probably had figured he was just dead weight. 

Sure enough, only silence. He gave a short exhalation of frustration, and put on his night vision goggles.

There, in the distance. He spotted two tell-tale orange blobs.

•

 _2003_ :

Cheok-Ying gently touches the screen of the treadmill. It’s long after normal working hours for the office, after he’d settled the kid. He didn’t really expect to think so, but he thinks that he rather liked him, suspicious six year old that he was. 

“Remarkable, isn’t it?” A voice voice sounds behind him, making him jump and swivel around to face the source.

Dr. Achaius flicks on the light.

A stout, not particularly handsome man, he nonetheless always held the appearance of kindliness and intelligence to Cheok-Ying. That impression had not yet held false.

“Doctor,” Cheok-Ying respectfully acknowledges, and rewarded with a clap upon the shoulder. Small grey eyes twinkled at him through spectacles, and the boy found it hard not to smile.

 

“One of the highest scoring individuals in his age group, eh? He beat your score.”

 

“That he did.” Cheok-Ying acknowledged, still smiling, if now a little ruefully. Achaius gestured at him. “Come now, sit down. Tell an old man what you thought of our newest applicant.”

“Clever. Unusually cognizant, completely aware of others and his surroundings, highly functional even when grieving for the loss of a parent. He’s quiet, but his skills for empathy are through the roof.” 

 

“We don’t test for empathy,” Achaius replies, sitting heavily on the doctor’s chair. Cheok-Ying shrugs, and Achaius waggled his finger at him. “Come now, Fir. You know that I don’t agree with my colleagues on that.”

The boy snorts, leans against the wall. “It doesn’t matter, anyway.” 

Achaius smiles at him. “It always matters. My colleagues only don’t recognize it for what it is, because they lack it themselves.”

•

 _2004_ :

Eiji is trying to keep track of how many assailants there might be, but it’s hard to tell while he’s on the move with complete radio silence. It’s frustrating; initially there were six people to each team, with three teams in total.

 

The rules that were explained were simple enough: hand to hand combat counted, as long as you hit a lethal or extremely debilitating spot (they were all armed with protective helmets and foam vests that would absorb the actual blows) and each child was given a night goggle setting with the helmet and one virtual handgun that worked in tandem; it acted as a real gun would, complete with a simulated jerking motion, but without a real bullet; a lethal or debilitating hit would be communicated to each member by a “ **GAME OVER,”** to them through the helmet, and collected immediately by the game proctors.

 

He’d downed six people so far, a team’s worth. Eiji was no fool, though: he was aware of the possibility that they could simply elude the proctors to find him and beat him up, Game or no game. Many of the children in the selected groups seemed vicious; some boasted at the time of selection that they veterans of the game already, at their age.

He moved more cautiously than ever through the trees, trying hard to not Unfortunately, there was a clearing ahead that there was no getting around. He looks up, tries to judge the upper branches. Yes, there really was no way around it. 

Eiji glumly decides to be a sitting duck, and leans against the trunk of the tree. It was hopefully better than being on the ground. He was beginning to shake when he stood, coming down from his adrenaline high.

 

With time to waste, he turns on his helmet and requests the dead/alive status of the opposing team members. _2 Alive,_ it blinks at him in orange. _8 Dead_.

Nuts, he thinks. It’s not over. But if there was one thing going for him; their exercise wasn’t exactly going by Battle Royale rules: they weren’t going to try to shove them all together in an effort to wrap things up. If you couldn’t find your opponent, it was on you.

So Eiji decides to make the game work for him. Let them try to find him, he thinks. 

But hours pass, the forest mostly silent. Against his will, Eiji’s eyes grew heavy.

He knew that falling asleep high off the ground in a precarious position wasn’t safe, but he was alone in the world now, with nothing and no one to love or grieve him. Ash was a hope, not an entity. 

He cared more about not being caught than dying, at this point.

Sorry, Mom, Dad. I might see you again a little sooner than you expect, he thinks, and consciousness slips away.

•

When he wakes, it’s to the sound of Cheok-Ying in his ear. It takes him a while to place the voice: he had rarely seen him after he initially was placed. Sometimes the older man would wave to him in the hallways, though.

“Kid. Kid!” 

“Don’t call me that,” Eiji grumbled, reaching up to rub his eyes and when he is only met with the cool glass of the helmet, opened them and was greeted with the pinks and oranges of dawn peeking through the trees.

Suddenly, he was wide awake. He’d slept through the entire night, without thrashing from nightmares as he usually did.

Instinctively, he looks down. In the light of day, he can see how far away from the ground he is: a wave of vertigo washes over him.

 

Cheok-Ying is nowhere in sight. “Where...?”

 

He hears soft laughter. “I’m talking through your helmet. I guess you wouldn’t know, since it’s your first game. Congratulations, kid. You won.”

 

Eiji blinks. He _won_? 

 

When Cheok-Ying, inside of the centre hears whoops and cheers through his headset, he smiles until he can feel his muscles aching.

“Alright, where are you, anyway? You must be hidden pretty good, neither of those two kids could find you. They ended up knocking each other out.”

 

“Um.” Eiji’s voice sounds sheepish through the headset. “I’m... not sure.” “What do you mean by that?” Cheok-Ying asks, curiosity peaked. 

“We have GPS built into our equipment, right? I’ll explain when you get here.”

Strange thing to say, Cheok-Ying thinks.

•

He gets there. It’s suddenly not so strange. His GPS is insisting that Eiji is in this location, but he can’t see him for the life of him- he searches through the trees, hoping to see the boy. 

“Eiji?” He asks. A sleepy grunt, then “What?” 

“Where are you? Your GPS says you’re here, but I can’t see you anywhere.”

 

“Oh. Um... oh, okay, I see you. Look up.”

Cheok-Ying gets a sense of vertigo. Hastily, he looks where directed. Eiji waves- from the _treetops_.

“Hey, could you get me down? I’d do it, but my hands hurt.”

•

 

_Washington DC, 2004:_

 

One fine, crisp day in DC, the kind with a blue sky that made you want to have a long stroll back home from work, The Kennedy Center was in fine form, with crowds bustling in and out of the building. 

 

Inside on the top floor, Doctor Achaius made his way through the Kennedy Center cafeteria; dodging tourists and locals alike, looking furtively around.

After a while, he spotted a hand waving in the back of the cafeteria, and recognizing it’s owner, heavily made his way there. “S’cuse me, sorry,” he says to mostly-friendly families, brushing past their children and couples at tables.

 

Finally, he arrived at his destination, and with a “Sorry I’m late,” he unceremoniously dumped his briefcase onto the table. With a grunt, he sat in one of the plastic chairs, and it creaks under his weight.

 

“Pleasant journey, Doctor?” the woman across from him says, dryly. She sets two bottles of water in front of him. Immediately, he snatches one. He’d been late, getting on the road. He chuckles. “Not bad,” and takes a swig. “I’m sorry for being late.” She waves off his apology, gracious.

From the very beginning of their partnership, she had always treated him to lunch after reports, regardless of extravagance. And that, among other things over some time, had steadily earned her his trust in whatever she asked for, even when it sounded initially strange to him. Not that he could _refuse_ , exactly to begin with but there were always ways of sneaking things around; perhaps she knew that about him:

She had been the one to request him to co-head the Center with her.

 

Clearing his throat, he carefully sets down the water and dives into his suitcase. There are quite a few documents to go through, but as usual, he fills her in on the brightest of their inhabitants at CORE. The rest of the research results would wait. 

“Subject 235 is doing alright, everything proceeding smoothly. He should be able to enter Langley,” meaning the headquarters of the CIA, “For entry as planned by next year. Marksmanship is in the top percentile, as it’s been for the last two years now, ect, ect. Subject 376 is looking promising, NASA has sent back some approval papers and we’re expecting her to begin crunching some numbers for them shortly.”

His co-head nodded, the picture of rapt attention. Encouraged, he continues for quite a while, remarking on this child and that child. Subjects with numbers they may be, and something of a small boarding school their center, but he was definitely proud of all of them, in his strange way. He never considered himself a father figure, and still didn’t- his passion was science - but even though their methods could be considered morally grey, he still attempted to do his best by all of them. He couldn’t say the same for much of his staff, but he tried to run herd on them as best as he could, anyway. 

 

By far, his colleagues weren’t perfect- but they were his arms and legs, and he relied on them, even as he tried to temper their... lack of natural empathy. Cheok-Ying was an exception, not the rule. 

 

Eventually, he slows to a halt, having said all he could about their most promising. However...

He pauses. Usually he waited for a complete progress to yield results. He’d always felt that only fools jumped the gun, always putting the cart ahead of the horse. 

 

He watches her nod, then without much ceremony, get up; presumably to order for both of them. “Wait,” he says, reluctantly and feels every inch the fool he has accused so many others of being. One thin, long eyebrow slowly rose on her face. “What is it, Doctor?”

 

“You once told me that...” he pauses, looks at the table for something to do. What he’s about to say sounds ludicrous, even to him. “You were looking for a specific candidate in mind. When CORE was originally founded.”

 

She stares at him for quite a while, a frightening hope in her eyes. Her olive green dress, full of knife-pleats, swaying in time to her breathing as she stood. 

Finally she sits back down, with deliberate slowness. Folding her hands upon the table, she pierces him with an unnerving gaze, a single-minded focus. Her face is transformed.

“What are you saying, exactly?” Her voice is like a knife’s edge, full of steel.

•

In another cafeteria, across a state line and some hundred miles or so away, a knife sinks into Eiji’s empty plate with a _thunk_. It’s got a serrated blade that shines meanly in the cold light. The sound is barely audible over the chatter that resounds through the cafeteria, but just the sight of it’s point makes a statement by itself. Some of the children gasp when they see it, curve away. Most of them begin clearing away their plates, finding better places to be.

 

Eiji looks at the owner of the knife, who was still holding on to it and clears his throat. Eiji never been really very good at diplomacy, but he’s always willing to try. “Yes?” The tall youth glares down at him; for some reason, Eiji is reminded of Arthur, though he bore only a passing resemblance at best.“Think you’re funny, _jap_?” The boy sneered, lip curling.

 

Eiji is forcibly reminded of being chased. This was the captain I shot, he thinks.

 

“What do you mean?” He asks, trying to be polite, even though he doesn’t really think it’ll help. It’s not the first time he’d encountered racism in America, not even the first time he’d seen it in this lifetime alone. There were a fair amount of “minority” children in the centre, more than white children; he wouldn’t be very surprised if the white children felt threatened.

But this kid had a bone to pick with him, it seemed and perhaps he ought to see it through, seeing as- he scans the room. Only cameras, no guards. If they were going to break up a fight, maybe they’d send someone, but it would take a while for them to get here.

The older Caucasian boy turns an interesting shade of puce and pulled out his knife; only to point it at Eiji, like ruining his plate was just the beginning.

 

But to Eiji’s alarm, the boy lurched forward with a yowl of pain and downed like a falling tree, narrowly missing him with the knife.

 

Beside the fallen, larger boy, there is a very small boy, with his hair tied back into a black scruffy top knot. Eiji catches him lowering his foot. What did he do, kick out the older kid’s knees?

“Ignore this fool, Arthur can’t stand that you earned the highest score last night.” An unpleasant weight falls in Eiji’s stomach as he glances at the downed boy, who was rolling underneath his seat. Memories flash in his mind’s eye of another Arthur, despite himself and shoves them away. 

He had no idea that there were _scores_ to beat in the game, or that other children could see them.

 

“You little fucker!” The Caucasian boy moans, and lunges for the kid, who pales slightly and begins walking back. Eiji, not being about to stand for _that_ , brings his plastic, ruined plate up and smashed it on Arthur’s head. 

There is a pause, and Arthur goes down again, eyes rolling back into his head.

The tiny assailant grins devilishly at Eiji; It was as if he were sharing a private joke with Eiji. It warmed him.

 

“Nice,” the kid commented appreciatively. “The name’s Liam Wong, but you can call me Shorter. What’s your name?”

Shorter...Wong? 

Ice filled his veins.

No. No, it can’t be. Eiji stares at the kid for so long, it had to be uncomfortable for him. It had to be a fluke. Right?

 

“I’m... Eiji.”

Liam’s-Shorter’s- jaw seems to unhinge briefly, then, upon seeming to recover, laughs a little uncertainly. “Sorry, sorry, I knew someone called Eiji. You...look a lot like him.” 

Excitement? Dread filled Eiji like a quixotic gas. “Yeah?” He asked, barely daring to hope. He tries clearing his throat. There’s a sudden lump in it. “Uh... what was his last name?”

“Okumura. You probably-“

 

Oh.

 

Without warning, tears begin dripping down his face. Oh, he thought he had closed this wound a long time ago. 

“ _Eiji_?”

•

 

“Eiji, man I have got to tell you, I am glad to see you. How the hell did you end up here?” Shorter is so _tiny_ , Eiji thinks, a little numbly. Is that how he got his name? “Shorter,” he chokes out, and continues crying. Shorter looks deeply uncomfortable. “Hey man, why are you crying?” the Chinese boy laughs, with a tinge of hysteria. “Not cause of old history?”

 

Shorter had joined him on the table shortly after Arthur had been carted away by orderlies, pleading Eiji’s case and his own. Eiji was much too in shock to be much help, but Shorter had spun that and his tears pretty well, too.

Right now Shorter was put in the unfortunate position of guiding Eiji through a mental breakdown. He had his arm slung around his shoulder, just like old times. The weight of it comforted Eiji, but it also brought back fresh waves of old memory; his heart felt like it could barely take it.

 

“Listen, Eiji. I was in so much pain- Ash,” Eiji broke down into a fresh bout of sobbing at this “Did the best he could. I really tried to maintain lucidity, man but it was a goddamn living nightmare. I’m glad that both of you,” he gave Eiji a little shake “ _both_ of you did right by me even when I,” Shorter shakily inhaled “When I didn’t do my best by either of you. They had me cornered, but there should of been something that I could of done.”

Eiji tries to stem his tears, gives it up as a lost cause. “I’m glad you’re here, Shorter.” He’s barely audible, but Shorter seemed to hear him anyway, because Shorter sighs, and leans his head on Eiji. “Yeah.” The word is tremulous, but full of sincerity. Beneath him, he can feel Eiji shaking.

 

Eiji feels the vestiges of guilt that he hadn’t considered Shorter before. He knows _why_ he _hadn’t_ , because Ash, being Ash if he had come to the same conclusions as Eiji, which he surely would, would probably tear the world down to find him, and that would make Eiji’s job easier to begin with. Not that... life didn’t happen. Or that years, years could pass by while they navigated the world, maybe trying to find each other.Maybe not. Eiji knew full well that it was very possible Ash would never be reincarnated.

 

But he’d found Shorter _somehow_ in this godforsaken, lonely world. He was unspeakably, horribly _glad_.

They sit like that for a long time, he and Shorter; an island in the world that is strange to them.

The cafeteria, ignorant of their doings, began to slowly empty.

“I thought I’d never get to eat your awful cooking again,” Eiji whispers, at last.

With a choked out laugh, Shorter shoves him.

•

“So what happened to you, dude? You turned into an assassin or something?” Shorter jokes, referencing the game. 

 

He invited Eiji, later that night to his room for some privacy to catch up. Fortunately, there were no cameras in the rooms for seven year olds- nothing for the researchers to spy on.

Eiji, though exhausted did not refuse his offer.

 

Sitting on the cream-colored carpet of Shorter’s floor, Eiji shook his head. “Hardly. Up until my... death, I was an _awful_ shot. Shot Dino, though.” He added wistfully. Any pain he caused Dino was justice metered, in his opinion.

Shorter’s eyebrows raised as high as they could go. “You _what?”_

“Shot Dino.” 

Shorter laughs, and laughs, and by the end of it, Eiji is grinning slightly. Shorter wipes the tears from his eyes. “Good for you, that old bastard deserved it. Where?”

“Shoulder.”

Shorter frowns, obviously recalling Ash’s own attempt. “Which one?”Eiji can barely remember, but... “Left.”

Shorter snorts, then descends into more laughter. “What, so you and Ash took a shoulder each and neither of you thought to aim for his nuts?” It was Eiji’s turn to laugh. (He can’t remember the last time he had done so, even when his mother had been alive.)

“Table was in the way,” he answers Shorter.

“Shit.”

The curse word sounds so strange in a high, unbroken voice that Eiji descends back into giggles.

After a while, Shorter joins him.

•

“So tell me, how do people know the scoreboard?” Eiji asks, much later on in the evening. They’re both doing homework, which was a strange sort of domesticity for both of them.

 

“What? The game scoreboard or-?”

Eiji blinks at the implication. “Are there multiple scoreboards?” 

“Sure. It’s located in the library.”

 

Oh. The one place Eiji hadn’t gone to in the year that he had stayed here. He knew that CORE had one, of course- but he hadn’t gone, out of fear it would make him relive too much. Libraries had been a constant with his loved ones, and while he had the wounds of his past life scab over by the time he had been old enough to begin learning and searching for ways to go back to New York, the death of his parents had gouged it back open with a vengeance.

He had relied heavily on his pre-learned knowledge for the courseload, and while he struggled, it was bearable. It kept his memories limited to being at night, anyway.

 

“Was it that I won that made Arthur mad?” Eiji asked, trying to sound casual.

Shorter gave him a strange look. “No, not exactly. I mean, yes. He’s played the game for longer than you and I.” He paused, attempting to gather his thoughts.

“I was there in the field. You must of seen it; there were two left, right? We were the two. Took some doing, but I knocked his ass out two seconds before he kicked me, and they counted it. Except I _actually_ knocked him out, and I was so damn tired at that point, I just fell asleep. So I came second. No, it was that you had crushed the records held by our age group- you annihilated a team’s worth of people, you had perfect fire to kill ratio, and no recorded hits. And, you hid so well that no one could find you.”

 

Eiji silently processed this, and Shorter peered at him. “Anyway, so what’d you do? You were a piss poor shot back then, and you just said that you never got better.”

 

Eiji shook his head. “I’ve been in the mandatory training for the last year or so, and I’ve gotten better-Might be because of my age. Faster response time, more accurate. But the game- it’s not _real_ guns, right? So it counts debilitating injuries, for all intents and purposes, as a kill.”

Shorter nods cautiously, and Eiji smiles wryly. “So basically, even if I’m aiming for someone’s head, it doesn’t matter if I miss them by a little. If it was a real gun, maybe they would of been able to kill me just fine even if I shot off their nose. Or lodged a bullet in their spine. It’d hurt, but...”

Shorter grimaces. “Yeah. Yeah, I get it.”

• 

“The boy would make a fine addition to the CIA,” Achaius hears Firenze before he actually enters, and upon seeing Achaius, Firenze looks like he’s bitten into a lemon.

 

Of course he does, Firenze never has a personal opinion upon any child, Achaius thinks with some amusement. Satisfying a need for a little sadism, he innocently asks, “Which boy?”

The female scientist, whom Firenze was talking to answers for him. “Eiji Nakamura.”

 

Achaius restrains himself from laughing, more out of pity than a need to be polite. “Oh? I think he’d be wasted on them.”

Firenze’s mouth looks like crunched tinfoil, and the female scientist looked merely interested. “Oh?”

“Yes. Firenze, your research does point out that he would be a fine future addition to Langley. But it is also true-“

•

In the wee hours of the morning, long after he snuck back to his room Eiji lies awake in the darkness and thinks of Family.

Family is always ripped away from him.( _His mother, lying on the table with her throat slashed, murdered for reasons he still had yet to understand)_

 

He _loves_ them fiercely, devotedly and then- they leave. Or he leaves.

Unbidden, Shorter Wong’s death rises to the forefront of his mind, and upon remembering how he fell on Eiji, lifeless and sickeningly grateful in his last moments, Eiji heaved. He barely makes it to the side of the bed, and for a long time, he is trapped inside of the memory, unable to escape.

 

At last, it rescinds it’s iron grip and Eiji is left to stare at a puddle of sick.

Tears gather.

 

He rolls over, staring blankly into the darkness. He wonders if Shorter, like him felt out of place in the world, with useless memories of a past life, both of them grown men trapped in bodies like flies in amber. 

Then he thinks of Ash. If Eiji is suffering, surely Ash’s first lifetime was infinitely worse: innocence stripped away again and again, hunted down simply for existing. How could he possibly _want_ Ash to live through a _second_ lifetime of remembering everything that happened, unable to escape? How could he ask that of him? Of anyone?

And yet, his traitorous heart still clung to the hope that he would see him again. Shorter Wong did nothing to quash it; it made his hope strong. 

I’m an awful person, to wish for that.

 Eiji cries, alone in the dark.


	4. Volume One, Part Two

_Somewhere in the Fiji islands:_

 

“Hey, you old fart. I need to talk to you.” A book slams down on the rattan bedside table, half-waking the old assassin. He’s well into his eighties, but old habits died hard: they said _danger! danger is here._ Fast as a wasp, Blancapins the source of the sound upon the ground, throttling it, his gnarled hands twisting.

Small hands slap at him uselessly; he presses harder. _Intruder_ , he thinks and wakes up more fully to look.

Crystalline green eyes burned up at him out of a white, snarling face. His grip loosens with shock, and watches the boy gag, oxygen returning.

 

“Did you get dementia or something?” The seven year old demanded from under him, voice croaky and harsh. “You stupid fucker. Get _off_ of me.”

 

Blanca shakes his head mutely. It was impossible, what he was seeing: and he wasn’t the betting kind of man on his own survival. His bones aren’t what they used to be, either; every movement was agony, protesting from the harsh treatment. If this boy was a threat, it was probably better not to move. “I said get _off me_!” Before he could register, Blanca’s back hits the wall, and he groans in agony.

 

A blow to the face, that Blanca does not return. He knows whom it is, now.

 

“Ash?”

Ash pauses mid-swing. “Oh good, you’re finally awake.”

“This is your way of waking someone up?” Blanca croaks. He wonders if he’s going to sport a shiner. “You look younger.”

“I’ll explain later. Christ, _you_ look _ancient_.” Ash hesitates, an expression of guilt flickering over his face as he looked over Blanca’s decrepit form. “Do you need anything?” Blanca repressed a laugh. “I look that bad, huh?” He wheezes when he sucks in air, and hopes he doesn’t bruise too badly later.

 

“I dunno, old man.” The boy grins, and it’s _so_ familiar. “You haven’t killed me yet.”

 

•

Blanca warms his hands on the tea that Ash serves, the fragrant steam scenting the air with notes of bergamot. “Unlike you to bring gifts,” he comments dryly and hears an audible snort from the doorway. “No, I just hate the flowery crap that you like.” Blanca nods, conceding.

When Ash takes a seat across from him at the kitchen table, Blanca sets down his cup. “So, Ash. I’ll spare you further pleasantries: What brings you here?”

 

“I need to find Eiji.”

 

Blanca sharply intakes. He might of guessed, he thinks to himself with a sudden sadness. But there was no way of sugar coating it.

“Eiji Okumura died in a car crash at the age of thirty-seven in New York. He was a well-celebrated photographer, and one of his best known works was “Dawn.””

 

Ash flinched upon hearing it, as if someone had slapped him. His lips went white. “I know.”

Blanca’s eyebrows rose. “You do, do you?” And watched as silent tears began trickling down his ex-pupil’s face. But when Ash spoke, it was remarkably steady.

“I had called the sister in Japan, asking for her brother, saying I was an old friend. She told me what happened.”

 

Blanca, for his old pupils sake decided to ignore the presence of tears. “So...?”

 

“So, I’m not giving up hope.”

 

Blanca sets down his cup, and uncharacteristically, feels rather lost for words. Of course, it’s not every day that your pupil comes back to you as the age of a schoolboy. Scientifically, it would be considered impossible, and perhaps this is where Ash drew his source of strength. “You know that even if he was... reborn, he may not remember you.” He says, as kindly as he knew how.

 

Blanca watches Ash’s young face twist in pain, and not for the first time, wishes he could alleviate it.

 

“I know,” Ash says, finally, looking away from Blanca, as if to shield himself from the truth. “It’s something that I’ve considered.”

“So why?” Blanca asks. Finding Eiji would likely cause Ash nothing but pain and heartbreak, and the uncertainty of the search would be nigh-unbearable.

 

Ash looks back at him with an unspeakable grief in his eyes as deep as the Pacific Ocean, and Blanca _understands_.

•

Blanca invites Ash to stay for as long as he likes. Ash accepts, to his surprise.

“I’ve got nowhere to go,” Ash says, by way of explaining.

 

Ash helps Blanca to the porch of his house after they both eat, and they look out onto the ocean, watching as the sun set and sank into the water.

“How are you going to go about searching for him?” Blanca asks, when the stars have risen above them both, shining cold and bright.

Ash looks into his lap. “I need your connections to do it. If... he remembers, he’ll show signs of intelligence beyond his years. I think he’ll try to go back to New York at some point, too- if he hasn’t already.” Blanca smiles. This was the Ash he remembered. “Are you so sure?”

 

“I might not understand this reincarnation business very well, but I _know_ Eiji.”

 

“What if he’s a child like yourself? What if he never reincarnates, or if he does, by that time you are an old man like myself?” Blanca dislikes playing the devil’s advocate for Ash, but it’s necessary. “Are you willing to spend your entire life waiting for something that may never come to you?”

 

“...Yes.”

 

Well, then. He never ceases to amaze me, Blanca thinks to himself. It was just as well Dino could never hold him, for Ash’s capacity to love was too great for him. “Alright. I’ll help you.” And with his aged, weathered hands, he reaches out to ruffle Ash’s hair.

 

Ash allows it with ill grace, squawking and squirming. He doesn’t push off Blanca’s hand, though.

 

Blanca smiles, his face hurting from muscles ill-used.

•

In Virginia, Eiji wakes.

The air, his mouth smells and tastes sour with vomit. His alarm hadn’t sounded, though; he had time yet before they were allowed into the cafeteria. Probably enough time to clean up, although he had no idea how to get rid of the smell on the floor.

He sighs and sits up, and stares into folded hands.

In the grey light of morning, things felt clearer to him, like a filthy window that had it’s first round of cleaning. It still wasn’t clear to him, but he knows this: if wishing for Ash was enough to will him back into his life, they would of been together already. God knows he wished, and begged for him back for how many years.

 

Maybe the grief would never truly fade. Shorter had reappeared in his life, and yet Eiji grieved for his passing still. But, it wasn’t about to stop him from moving forward, from cherishing the Shorter that he now knew.

 

So he had to apply that to Ash, too.

 

He would continue to look for Ash, and if Ash needed him, then he would, of course do whatever he could.

But if Ash could not remember him, Eiji resolved, then he would be happy for Ash, and no second-guessing it.

 

Shorter had remembered him- had remembered, just as he remembered.

 

Relief washed over Eiji, gentle as a mother’s caress, and felt blessed.

•

“ _His progress is unprecedented. Whatever we can throw at him, he can take. We put him on media blackout, and he came out on top. He’s well beyond college grade now, and on track to begin his reading on the top experts in the field. He may even surpass them in a few years._

_As I’ve said, I believe he’s well on his way to proving my hunch right.”_

_“Not good enough. We must be absolutely certain- we cannot make a mistake, not on this.”_

 

•

“Eiji! My man,” Shorter calls to him, loud and cheerful, even drowning out the chatter around him.

Eiji smiles at the sight and began pushing through the chattering crowd, trying to reach the other boy at the buffet line.

“Get some slop.” Shorter grandly dumps ten pieces of buttered toast onto a plate and hands it to Eiji, who accepts it withsome bemusement.

“We’re not in prison, Shorter.”

“Oh, are we not?” Shorter asks, loftily. Eiji pauses at hearing that, and raised a piece of toast in salute. “Fair enough.” The center was, in it’s own way, a prison.

And upon seeing that Shorter was having trouble getting more food, even receiving an elbow to the face when he tried to reach for the bacon, Eiji waves the toast, getting his attention. “Here, Shorter. I can’t eat all of this. Let’s share.”

 

Shorter and Eiji walk from the line, with Shorter muttering darkly. “Little monsters. I’m glad I never had any.”

 

“You used to have an entire town’s worth,” Eiji commented, smiling.

 

Shorter chuckles. “Yeah... I guess I did.”

 

Eiji gives Shorter most of his toast, lying that he wasn’t hungry when the other protested. He watches the other boy tear into the eight pieces of toast with the ferocity of a wolf. Shorter did really look so young, now. It was hard to believe he was seven, looking at his bird-like bones and short stature. “How’d you arrive _here_ , Shorter?”

Shorter looks up, and tries to speak through three pieces of toast. Eiji laughs. “Finish eating first.” Shorter flashed him a double thumbs up, and for a while, they sat in silence, listening to the chatter of the morning.

 

Finally, Shorter swallowed the last piece, and spoke. “There was a neighborhood bombing in Chinatown. I was living in a foster home with a bunch of other kids, but a lot of them got injured in the explosion. I was offered a place here, and...” he sighed. “We were doing everything we could to scrape together money, and I was one of the youngest. I wasn’t hurt.”

 

“So you left.” So that they’d have more money.

 

Shorter nods, facial features tight. “Then I got here.”

“And found that they were training children soldiers,” Eiji added, softly.

 

“Yes. How did you feel, when you first...?”

 

Eiji looks down at the leftover toast. “We were six.”

 

•

_Eiji’s mostly in shock still from the announcement, if he’s perfectly honest with himself. CORE hasn’t been perfect by any means, and the first month or so had been hard, pushing himself to the limit intellectually, but other than that, it hadn’t rung any further alarms. Most days, he collapsed into bed, unable to think further. But this..._

_The live firearms instructor paced in front of the group, his leather boots steadily wearing a path into the grass. His features were hawklike, full of angles and edges, harsh white against the gloom of the forest._

_“Now, we will not be using life fire- but each of you will be trained, in the interim using a virtual reality set. I will be handing you each one firearm, and they will act just as real weapons in the simulation, and move in the same way.” He turns to face the group of the children who stood before him._

_“We will be teaching you marksmanship; firearms are easy to use to kill in comparison to some other things that actually require some acquired skill. This is why our country in particular suffers from school shootings, among other types of gun related massacres. We will not be teaching you how to indiscriminately kill with a gun, any wretched fool can do that. We will be teaching you how to_ use _this, in the same way that a surgeon uses a scalpel. A madman can use it as a weapon of murder; those graduating who may go on to serve our country will get their hands dirty to save lives.”_

_And when Eiji looks, the eyes of the boys next to him are wide and worshipful. Fury burned in his gut at the sight, and he feels sickened on their behalf._

_•_

_They shuffle into line, all of them. Eiji stares into the back of the girl standing in front of him; she had roughly chopped hair that rolled into tight, black ringlets, and despite her butter-yellow cardigan, she was shivering. He would offer another jacket for her, if only he had one, Eiji thinks to himself, sadly. It was pitiful._

_It was silent around the children, only broken by the whispering of the wind and the soft shuffling of feet across grass. The children murmur around him, bright eyed and curious despite the chill. They all watch how the one in front is doing through their screens, taking aim at various virtual targets on the trees, seeing how well they aim to begin with._

_Eiji feels sick, just watching those little hands take aim, over and over again._

_Before he knows it, he’s in front of the line and the teacher curtly nods at him. He shakily exhales, and raises his gun. There is a fine tremor in his hands that does not translate to the screen of the virtual reality, but one that he feels all the same._

_Why hadn’t he stopped the lesson? He asked himself, abruptly. He could’ve shouted, made a fuss, done anything to put off that awful path to destroying their innocence, of ruthless exploitation. He grit his teeth, and the shaking of his gun became more pronounced. He was taking too long, reluctance to participate showing: the instructor was beginning to silently radiate animosity, expression ominous._

_All effort would be for naught in the end, he concludes, bitterly. they were little better than dogs to these people, taught to do deadly tricks: and furious with the adults, with CORE, but himself most of all, he fires._

_•_

_He returns again, and again to the grounds, finally understanding-_ really _understanding Ash felt the way he did. He shoots, and he shoots, and he gets better, and he hates himself a little more each time. His aim becomes more steady, his draw time becomes quick._

_One day, he promises silently, a dull, bitter fury coating the pit of his stomach. I’ll destroy this place, and no child will ever have to learn to kill again, with nothing and no one to speak for them._

_He fires again, and his mouth tastes of copper._

•

Eiji snaps back to reality when Shorter speaks again, drawing his attention.

 

“Hey, you know those kids that go for medical testing? You know, a lot of them don’t come back. They say that they’ve been adopted by some families, but we all think it’s horseshit.”

Eiji hadn’t known that, blinks. “Not. Really?”

Shorter nods seriously, his ponytail bobbing back and forth. “They also say that the scientists aren’t human, or something. I’d believe it. No human could have that many sticks up their ass.”

 

Eiji chokes and slaps Shorter’s arm, laughing. “You can’t say that! We’re in front of children.”

 

Shorter peers down his nose at Eiji. It’s really quite impressive, since Shorter is a full head shorter than Eiji. “Eiji, _we’re_ children.”

•

 

“Can I see your schedule?” Shorter asks after they receive the daily handouts. Eiji wordlessly hands Shorter the paper, who then scanned it, eyebrows steadily rising. “Holy shit. Dude, why do you have all of these classes?”

 

Eiji shrugs. It wasn’t like he was ever given an explanation. The thought probably was ridiculous to anyone in charge.

But as far as he knew, every other child had something similar. “I don’t know, ask those guys with the sticks up their ass,” he replies, and watches as Shorter cracks up at the reminder, smiling.

The only time he could reliably see other children was all at the same time, times like now. When he looked, heads were bowed over their individual papers, as usual. Some of the children were chatting to one another across their plates of breakfast, eager to use the personal time that they had. “Isn’t it normal?” Eiji asks, more curiously. Shorter seems to sober at this, and asks seriously:

 

“Eiji, what’s a normal schedule to you?”

 

Eiji frowns at this, confused. “What do you mean? I have new subjects every day.” Shorter laughed. “Pull the other one.”

 

Eiji continues looking at him steadily, though internally he’s starting to feel alarmed. He’d never considered that something like his schedule was an anomaly; he’d simply accepted it with everything else. Everything had been strange for him when he had arrived, and he hardly would see the same classmate twice, anyway- he had just figured that they were in the same boat as he was.

 

Shorter, seeing that he was serious, dropped the paper. “New subjects, Eiji? What the fuck? “Identifying rare types of poison and fungi and how to prepare them” is on here! We just started guns, we’re not expected to be fancy shmancy assassins yet or anything.”

 

Eiji shrugs. “I don’t know, Shorter. Gun-toting seven year olds sounds pretty fancy shmancy to me.” It comes out more bitter than he had intended.

Shorter shuddered. “I _hate_ that you said that out loud. Put it back.”

“Put _what_ back?” 

 

Shorter stares at Eiji for a long while, then silently passes his own paper.

It’s much less decorated. Instead of thirteen subjects, there are only six.

“You know what, Eiji? This has been my schedule for the last four months since I arrived.And I’m actually ahead of my peers- most of them have five subjects. Who the fuck is taking these classes with you?”

Eiji colors. “I’ve...never remembered their names.”

 

“...You don’t. Know their names.”

 

“Well, I’ve never had reason to, they’re always changing,” He protests. “Most of them I never see again.”

“... Okay, so let me get this straight.” Shorter’s voice rises. “You get new subjects every single day, you never see the same student twice, and how long has this been going for?”

 

“A year,” Eiji answers, with trepidation.

Shorter nods, and then slaps him, hard across the head.

 

Eiji is still reeling when Shorter begins shouting. “You jackass, you might be older than me, but you’re totally _stupid_! How on earth could you think this was normal!”

 

“Huh?”

 

“Don’t you ‘ _huh_ ’ me!” Shorter drops back to his bench, breathing heavily through his nose. Most of their table had gone silent, looking at them. Eiji sheepishly smiles at them.

“Eiji.” Shorter says in a low, dangerous voice. “You’re lucky that I like you, or I would be _strangling_ you.” Eiji gulped. “Listen. You are not following any _kind_ of normal schedule. Are you listening to me?” He stabs his finger at the paper. “ _Not. Normal._ ”

Eiji’s feeling a little shellshocked by now, but steadily replies, “Okay, but what do you want me to do about it?”

 

“...Ugh, nothing I guess.” Shorter groans, runs a hand over his face. “Look. What kind of age are the people in your classes?” The morning was certainly one for revelations, Eiji thinks to himself glumly. “It started out with six to seven year olds when I got here... but within the few months, most of the people with me... I’d guess that they’re at least nine to ten? I don’t really know.”

 

Shorter steeples his fingers and sighs. “Okay. So, some of my peers, though they _don’t_ really have extra subjects, like yours truly, some of them do take advanced classes when they do _really_ well. Sometimes they even _keep_ taking them when they can keep up with the workload.”

 

Eiji nods, and Shorter continues. “If I had to guess, from the sound of it, they’ve accelerated your education solely on the advanced courses, and the one class you take is just one class. Then they send you forward. And yeah, they do this sometimes when the new ones arrive, just to see where we all are for our age range. But they’ve been doing this to you for over a _year_ now.”

 

Eiji blinks. Then laughs. “No way.”

Shorter shrugs. “S’the only explanation that I’ve got, honestly. They have to be putting you somewhere. How the hell have you been keeping up?”

 

Eiji looks down at his hands. Even though it made sense, it sounded ridiculous. He was intellectually advanced, yes, but it was mostly because of the previous lifetime. And Shorter Wong wasn’t an idiot, so even if it was true, why wasn’t Shorter in the same boat as him?

 

“Eiji... have you...?”

 

The bell rings, and Shorter’s question is lost.

•

Eiji is introduced to computer programming that day. Though he doesn’t outwardly show it, he’s relieved. It was the first time he’d seen a computer in over a year, and out of everything else from the library at home, he missed computers the most. The ones before him looked nothing like the library computer, made it look positively clunky by comparison.

 

These were small, and white with little white speakers on each side.

 

This might be my chance, Eiji thinks with a rush of hope. He had taken so _much_ for granted, living in peaceful suburbia.

 

He listens intently to the lesson. He might not be able to get a plane ticket to New York right now, but this might be just as good, if he played his cards right.

 

•

He turns on the computer, and searches. The internet signal _was_ there, when he turned it on. But even as he combed, there was no search engine to be found. Well, he thinks. Let’s see how long that lasts.

•

 

He stands back from the computer, and cracks his knuckles: they make loud, popping noises in the silence of the classroom. Night had fallen, and he had stayed much longer than the other students, having begged off of the teacher for more time, and now he was dangerously close to missing dinner. It was worth it, though. He had done what he had set out to do.

It rudimentary at _best_ , but he was feeling kind of proud of it. 

It was also easier than he had thought it was going to be: if using the computer had felt natural at home, it felt suspiciously easy now; it flowed like water under his fingertips. After the first half hour, he stopped referring to the booklet guide. 

 

Maybe he’d have a future in hacking, he thinks to himself, grinning. like those action movies with the guy that always went “I’m in.”

•

 

He joined Shorter at dinner, sitting beside him at the table. “Hey, Shorter,” he says, but it’s barely audible over the excited din of the cafeteria; the kids were preparing to leave. Shorter looks up with surprise, and with a big smile, waves his hand in greeting. “Hey man!” Eiji thinks he says, though he has to read his lips to do it. Shorter gestures at the platter of food still left on his plate. It seemed to be an array of chicken wings. “They stopped serving. I saved some for you. Where were you?”

“Computer programming class,” Eiji answered, and tears into a drumstick. Shorter gestures at him to indicate he couldn’t hear, and Eiji waves him off. It could wait, and Shorter shrugs. “My room?”

•

When Eiji enters Shorter’s room for the second time, he takes a moment to absorb his surroundings. Last night he’d been too absorbed in finding Shorter again, but now he had room to be curious.

“Looking at the digs, huh?” Shorter asks, brushing past him to close the door. “Well, it’s not much, but it’s home now.” The room had a map of manhattan tacked on it’s wall for decoration, and there was a small hanging of a Chinese firecracker amulet of some kind next to the bed. The characters written were ones to ward away evil, from what he could tell.

Shorter’s desk was cluttered with photos, and Eiji felt a pang of loss.

 

He moved closer, looking at the various faces. Several children, including Shorter beamed up at him. Most of them couldn’t of been much older than Shorter now, but there was one older girl in the mix, with fluffy, spiky hair. He frowns in recognition. “Is that...?”

 

“Nadia? I think so.” Shorter finishes, coming to stand behind him. “You _think_ so?” Eiji asks, half-turning, and Shorter shrugged, a bitter smile twisting his lips. “She’s my sister from this lifetime, but she has pretty strong attacks of deja-vu. She’s the one who started calling me Shorter, you know.”

 

“In this lifetime..?”

“Both,” Shorter sighs, and reaches over to touch the picture. “I left her there all by herself. I hope she’s okay.” Withdrawing his hand, he added, “You know, we still don’t know what happened to our parents- they just walked out one day and never came back.”

 

Eiji hugged him, and Shorter let him.

 

“I don’t know what I was hoping for when I came here, you know. But it sure as fuck wasn’t to be taken in by a bunch of megalomaniacs.” Shorter attempted to joke, but there was a tremor as he spoke.

 

They remained like that in an embrace, and Eiji did not comment on the silent sobs wracking Shorter’s frame, only tightening his hold.

•

 

“We should free them, you know.” Eiji says to Shorter. They’re both lying on the bed, shoulder to shoulder. Their hands are not intertwined, but just feeling the other beside them is enough.

 

The room is dark, and like last night, Eiji stares up into the blackness. Unlike then, though he was not alone, and it made the difference, hearing the gentle sound of breath beside him.

 

“Who?” Shorter’s voice is soft, sure. Eiji can tell he’s already made his decision, even as he’s asking.

 

“The children.”

 

He feels Shorter nod, and continues. “You know, when I trained myself to shoot, I swore to myself I’d dismantle this place. Whatever it took.”

“Jesus, Eiji.” But Shorter’s voice, despite the words, does not hold judgement, only observation.

 

“I swore that they’d rue the day they gave me a weapon,” and when Eiji laughs, the sound is watery. Warm tears begin to trickledown his temples, and onto the bed. “And that they’d meet their demise with the weapons that they gave. But,” and at this he feels Shorter shift with interest, “there’s more than just weapons that they’ve given me. To _us_.”

 

Shorter holds his breath, and releases it in one long rush. After a long silence, he asks: “... Are you asking me if we should lead a rebellion?”

It’s such a serious situation, and he really shouldn’t, but Eiji intones, “Shorter-Won, you’re my only hope.”

 

They both dissolve into silent giggles, and their tears of grief for childhood lost melt together with their laughter.

•

“We should steal the blueprints of the building and the security layout, you know. If we’re doing this,” Shorter says,

 

“Yeah.” Eiji says simply. As far as he cares, he can evade the guards. It’s the cameras that he’s worried about.

•

 

On a mahogany desk in New York, Manhattan an apple computer lights up with a notification.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to my wonderful beta Moneera-87!
> 
> And thank you to all of the readers and the wonderful people who have commented and bookmarked and subscribed and given kudos!! I’m so touched every time I get a notification hearing that this was recieved well :,) comments feed the muse, and I love talking to you guys! Every time I reply though, it’s likely that I’ve just updated so check it out! (Finger guns) but thank you all so so much! I hope you will enjoy this journey of reincarnation.


	5. Volume One, Part Three

 

As far as Luciana was concerned, this morning was much the same as every morning.

 

At 7 am she woke up, said her prayers, opened her suitcase to find clothes, and took the crowded elevator full of other children to the cafeteria.

 

She _hated_ doing that: the wait for the elevator, her stomach rumbling, then being squished against the other bodies inside, desperately trying not to look at another peer in the eye, insides cringing and crawling with mingled anxiety and embarrassment, then being swept out in the crowd, like a fish caught in a current.

 

She shuffles along in the line to the cafeteria, and when she is handed a tray, she accepts with a muttered word of thanks.

 

As she looks over heads and shoulders, their food was all shades of beige, as ever. She wonders why she tries to look, anymore. There was a single bowl of salad that was more myth than reality: iceberg lettuce, usually decimated before she or most of the other children could get to it.

 

As they all walk forward with single-minded intensity, a hive mind with many legs, she thinks to herself: Once, she would of been met with the sight of Molletes on the table and her grandfather’s smile, but those days were now long gone. Her heart twists with remembered grief, and sadly, she reaches over shoulders for a fork.

 

When she reaches the serving platters of food, she sees that most of the seasoned items were already gone; glumly, she shovels herself a plateful of unseasoned white beans and prepares to make do.

 

“Luciana!” She hears from behind her, barely audible through the roar of sound. She blinks, turns to see the owner of the voice: Shorter, from her history class (barely a set of eyes above the sea of shoulders) is frantically waving to her, pulling in his wake a boy she hadn’t seen before, around their age, wan-looking and harried, but smiling.

 

Her curiosity begins to rise, and intrigued, she waves back in greeting.

 

•

 

Back in New York, Manhattan, Yut-Lung traces the frame of the computer in the stillness of his office, silk sleeve draping against the wood of his desk.

Hours hadn’t officially started yet for the day, and today he woke up unusually early, and had decided to come into the office- only to be met with... _this_.

 

As far as things went, Yut-Lung thinks to himself, it was by far the _strangest_ message he’d ever gotten, and that... was saying something.

He sat in his leather chair, feeling the beginnings of a headache. He was getting too old for this, he thinks, wryly and rakes a hand over his face, a gesture he’d picked up from Sing, over the years.

 

It was...impossible, he thinks, dropping his hand, staring at the ceiling. He hadn’t seen the body himself, of course, but Eiji Okumura had been dead for years. And unlike... Ash Lynx, he had no reason to possibly fake his death.

He scoots forward in his mobile chair, suddenly struck by inspiration. He looks down into his hands on the table, now folded, his mind whirring.

Unless... New York had become too much of a reminder for him; Sing would’ve looked for Eiji if he had simply up and left- would’ve never left well enough alone. Sing did always love that boy too much, Yut-Lung reminisces. His wife was one thing, but Eiji was... he had _attached_ himself to Eiji.

 

It wasn’t completely out of the question that Eiji could’ve had connections to disappear himself, Yut-Lung supposes; Eiji had trolled the underworld for _years_. But it wasn’t something he, Yut-Lung would’ve thought Eiji Okumura would do. _Very_ interesting.

 

The “Eiji” in the computer message had written very much like the photographer, and it was rather...disconcerting. There were ways of duplicating such things, naturally but message talked casually of the past, things that had never been put to paper before.

 

“ _I know you’ve wanted to kill me, Yut-Lung,”_ it had read. “ _But after Ash, I suppose there was no point- I must of just been a painful reminder. I’m glad you’ve had Sing for all this time- I hope he’s okay._

_Now, and perhaps this is a mistake on my part, but I have no choice: I must tell you that news of my death have been exaggerated- and that I need your help. I’ve been imprisoned in a certain facility- the coordinates are at the bottom- but as far as the the country knows, I don’t exist there._

_I was able to gain access to a computer after a year or so in captivity, so I am sending this message to you in the hopes you will find it in yourself to not merely leave me to my fate. Listed is everything I can think of that might indicate that it is really me.”  
_

 

It contained several embarrassing incidences, (such as the time he gotten incredibly drunk at Sing’s wedding, climbed on a table and sang “ _Wo Ai Ni”_ for the new couple, much to Sing’s embarrassment) and some hard-hitting ones, such as:

“ _I know you freed Ash the night we broke out of Dino’s Manor.”_ Information that it was likely, indeed that only Eiji Okumura knew. Before, he would of thought that the knowledge would of died with Ash Lynx- but it was equally as likely, coming to think of it, he would confide in Eiji.

 

Despite himself, Yut-Lung was, and he cursed himself- _curious_. Damnit, he was curious like he hadn’t been in a long time. Despite the hard work of running what he did, it could be incredibly monotonous at times- being a desk jockey was not terribly exciting.

 

This was the most interesting thing that happened to him in years, and as he sat up in his chair, his mind felt alert and sharp. 

•

 

Luciana finds herself sitting with Shorter and the strange new kid, who appeared to be quietly ferrying Shorter food from his plate- a new habit, if she had to guess. He was a solid five inches taller than Shorter, someone who wouldn’t get accidentally elbowed in the face when there was food to be had... probably how it got started.

 

When he offers her some of his toast and cheese, she waves him off; though she appreciates the gesture. His plate appeared too diminished already.

 

As the three of them begin to eat, she takes the time to surreptitiously scrutinize the stranger’s facial features. Short, fluffy black hair- probably growing out; hadn’t seen scissors in a long time, if she had to guess. A nice, kind face.

But she definitely hadn’t seen him before, she decides. He wasn’t in any classes that she knew about, but maybe he was new?

With a bolt of horror, she remembers Ajit, the boy she usually ate with in the morning, and frantically, she cranes her head around to look for him. It was for naught, though: Her friend was nowhere to be found. Concerned, Luciana hoped that he doesn’t take offense to finding her with them. She had no idea if he was the jealous type, but she wasn’t ready to find out:

Eating with her friend was the one pleasure she usually had in all of this monotony. Her stomach tenses with anxiety, but she returns to eating, forcing down bland spoonfuls of beans. He’d find her eventually, she hopes.

 

“Thish is meeji,” Shorter says to her in mid-mouthful, eventually seeming to remember his manners- sort of.

 

She half-cringes at the sight of the chewed up food in Shorter’s mouth and laughs. “Shorter, eat. Don’t try to talk. Sorry, my name’s Luciana,” she introduces herself, extending her hand across the table, giving up her attempts to eat.

 

The boy shakes it, a shy smile spreading across his face. “I’m Eiji. How do you know Shorter?”

 

Eiji, that sounded familiar for some reason, she thinks, and her mind begins to whirr.

 

“I should be asking you that,” she retorts, smiling. “Shorter’s in my history class,” she explains. “And when he’s not in my history class, he can do a pretty mean crash course on Chinese history. He stands on the table in the library and orates,” she finishes, dryly. Eiji stifles a snort of laughter, grinning and turns to Shorter. “Why haven’t I seen that yet? Have you been holding out on me?”

 

Shorter shrugs expressively, and continues his impression of a vacuum on his plate. Eiji just shakes his head fondly, which makes Luciana think, resting her head in her hand, elbow on the table. Despite the fact that Shorter was well-liked in their peer group, she’d never seen him with _friends_ \- anyone he hung outside of class, when they weren’t working. He always seemed to eat by himself. They were awfully familiar, for all that.

 

“Have you been here long?” Luciana attempts to delicately inquire, and Eiji, upon hearing this, looks surprisingly uncomfortable. Out of the corner of her eye, Luciana sees Shorter shoot Eiji a near-indecipherable look: something that looked nearly like pity.

 

Eiji laughs self-consciously. “Uh, I’ve been... here for over a year now.”

 

She blinks, thrown. He’s been here for a year now? Longer than she’s been here! She opens her mouth- and with a bolt of recall, her brain prompted her to where she saw the name “Eiji” before: in the library, the glowing letters detailing the win of a fellow seven year old in “The Game.”

For weeks, people had speculated who it was: she hadn’t paid much attention to it at the time; her main forte wasn’t firearms, after all. But she did remember it; it was a pretty significant event.

 

Her mouth stays open.

 

Eiji takes it as shock that he’d been here for a long time, and he steadily grew more uncomfortable looking. She shuts her mouth with a _snap_ , and looks at her food for a moment, trying to process. The sweet-looking kid in front of her had taken down _six other people._

Five minutes ago, she probably would of guessed that he was the kind that rescued bugs on the floor from getting stepped on.

 

“So, I just remembered where I heard your name. Are...you the one who won the last game?” She asks, still looking at her food, deliberately trying to be casual.

 

“Um...Yeah, that’s me.”

 

There’s a long pause. She looks up. He looks still as affable-looking as ever, doe-eyed and sweet. Respect begins to well up and rise in her chest.

 

“... _Damn_ , dude.”

•

 

After they had received their schedules, Eiji watches the Latina as she builds up steam, chattering away. If he’s being honest with himself, it’s kind of perplexing- no one has ever been _excited_ over him before. 

“No, really- Everyone’s been talking about you! And no one’s seen you- except for Shorter, clearly,”

Whom Luciana spears with an unkind look. Shorter cringes slightly at the sight of it and raises his hands in surrender, which Eiji finds amusing.

Luciana, able to cower a grown man: she would probably grow up to be formidable, he thinks with a smile. It was strange, talking to another non-reincarnated kid like this- he hadn’t, really for a long time now, but it was... good.

“Ay, Luce, I’m introducing now. By the way, man- if there’s anyone in our peer group that could go to NASA, it’ll be this girl.”

Luciana, appearing to be startled at the compliment, utters an unsure-sounding laugh. “Yeah, okay Shorter- I dunno what they do with us after graduation, but I sure don’t think that they let us do whatever we want.”

 

The bell rings.

 

•

 

“So, Ajit,” Lucianasays by way of greeting, dumping her bag on the table. The Indian boy turned to her sullenly, his usual charming smile absent. Guilt flared in the pit of her stomach at the sight of it, and she smiled sheepishly. Her friend seemed to instantly soften at the sight, hurt beginning to melt.

“Luce, where WERE you? I was looking all over for you!” He exclaimed, indignant.

 

She shushes him.

“Ajit, listen to this-“

 

•

 

Cheok-Ying walks with a spring in his step.

After some long weeks, the day was _finally_ here where he would be allowed his annual vacation time off. He’d already booked his tickets, and with this last folder to deliver to Dr. Achaius, he could clock in and officially start his vacation. He knocks on the door, but there is no answer.

Frowning, he tries the door handle. It twists readily in his hand.

 

 _I’ll just dump it and go- Dr. Achaius just said to leave it earlier... he must of gone for the day,_ Cheok-Ying reasons to himself, and he enters.

 

Dr. Achaius is there, sitting in the brightly lit office, hunched over, as if to massage his feet. He does not see Cheok-Ying immediately, but Cheok-Ying certainly sees _him_ : Dr. Achaius’s lower half of his body appears to be partially unclothed, and what he can see is awful and misshapen, large and fleshy- a long tail, like a mane of hair droops limply off of the chair.

But that is not what captures Cheok-Ying’s attention:

Dr. Achaius’s feet seem horrible and warped, unusually shaped- like fleshy hooves. A deep groove goes down the middle of the foot- there are no toes, no nails in sight. It is unlike anything Cheok-Ying has ever seen. Suddenly, the Doctor’s heavy tread makes an awful sort of sense.

 

He takes a step back, fear rising up and choking him, gripping him by the throat and shaking him. Not human, he thinks, numbly. Noth u m a n—

 

Dr. Achaius’s eyes look up.

 

They are terribly grey and wise as they ever have been.

 

“Ah, my boy. You’re early.”

 

•

 

It’s not long after sunset in the autumn of Virginia; the sun is setting gently through the trees, piercing through the darkness with it’s golden light.

 

Unfortunately, inside of the facility, there are no windows to witness the sight- instead, classes had ended for the day for the younger children, and Eiji and Shorter, for the first time are being ushered to the Library by a set of excited children: Luciana and Ajit, respectively.

 

“The others are going to be so pumped, man! We’ve been wondering _forever_ who the mystery man is!” Ajit enthuses, practically bouncing as he walks, barely able to contain himself.

Eiji walks with them, baffled by the attention. Shorter is busy smiling to himself, though Eiji’s unsure why.

Eiji leans over to whisper in Shorter’s ear, and though Ajit hardly notices in his excitement, Eiji sees that Luciana is watching with an eagle’s gaze. He ignores it.

“I... haven’t gone to a library since my mother died,” he murmurs to Shorter, and the smile fades off of Shorter’s face, and he nods seriously, immediately, _thankfully_ grasping the significance of what Eiji was telling him.

“Do you want me to get you out of this?” Shorter asks bluntly, expression completely absent of judgement.

It was supposed to be a “ _study session”_ with Luciana and Ajit, and there wasn’t really another way to study for normal people- as much as anyone could be _normal_ in this place, anyway.

While typically, Eiji _did_ do his work in his room, there were in fact no _real_ resources to speak of in the rooms, and the other kids weren’t actually _supposed_ to go to other bedrooms. So Eiji had agreed at the time the library was suggested, if reluctantly.

 

Eiji was still feeling reluctant, but... he exhales. “No, I don’t want to run.” Because this was important to him. When Shorter wanted to introduce him to his friends, Eiji took it as a sign, a gift he should take with both hands. He’d been lonely, grieving for so long.

 

Shorter rubs his shoulder, expression still sober and serious. Luciana had joined Ajit by now, chattering away. 

It was such an adult expression on Shorter’s face, and when Eiji looked at it, his throat closed up.

 

“Whatever you decide, Eiji- I’m with you.”

 

•

 

There wasn’t very much studying that was being done, Eiji finds. After the whispers made the rounds around the library, he’d been mobbed with excited groups of other children who had seen the result of the game on the screen, which he now saw: it was a big old thing, displaying people’s scores in the peer groups on subjects History, Mathematics, you name it- and of course, The Game, which was the culmination of the firearms course. 

“How’d you do it?” was a common refrain. “Good job on kicking Arthur’s butt,” was another.

Arthur, unlike another Arthur he knew, seemed to be terrifically unpopular in this crowd, to Eiji’s mild amusement. Sadly, he wondered if it had anything to do with the fact that most of the children here were of color, one way or another- hardly any caucasians. They outnumbered kids like Arthur by the dozen; and perhaps for the first time, a kid like Arthur had found himself in the minority.

 

Eventually though, the “study session group” had settled around his library table- new friends, (Luciana and Ajit,) and a new addition: Tiny, a gentle giant with soft eyes, Shorter’s English classmate; Eiji had been amazed at his size- at his height, he easily could pass for an eight year old or older. When he had asked after Eiji himself, instead of being enthused about his militia prowess, Eiji had warmed immediately to him.

Jack, Tiny’s older brother had stopped by to ruffle both Shorter’s and Tiny’s head, causing indignant squawking from both of them. He waved to Eiji, too, which he felt was rather nice. Shorter had slyly introduced Jack to Eiji as “Tiniest,” to which eye rolls and groans had been made by every member of the table.

 

“Tiniest!” Shorter had insisted, upon seeing their reactions. Tiny playfully cuffed his head, and as Shorter whined, Tiny muttered, “Jack only lets Shorter get away with it. He pretends to go deaf every time Shorter says it. We’re hoping he’ll give it a rest,” which sent Eiji into a fit of laughter.

As the night wore on, Eiji found himself relaxing.

 

“You okay?” Shorter whispers, under the guise for asking help with work. Eiji nods cautiously. To be truthful, at the time hadn’t been entirely sure about Shorter’s suggestion that he be introduced to the others, old paralysis seizing him. He had lived so long trapped in the past, making new friends felt like using forgotten limbs.

 

But Shorter had introduced him to all of them, and as opposed to feeling uncomfortable around Eiji, it was just the opposite- they were so endearing, so welcoming that despite the mental age gap, he truly started to feel fond of everyone present, despite the brief amount of time he’d spent with them. He wonders, was it hubris that prevented him from interacting with them before? Or was it only grief?

 

The library around them, too looked nothing like his old neighborhood’s, or indeed, even like the New York library where Ash loved to sit. Unlike the rest of the building, there seemed to have been special thought put into the decor of the library; the carpet was maroon, woods golden and blond, and books as far as the eye could see. There were rooms on the side to have some peace and quiet, but unlike most regular libraries, there seemed to be a lack of a quiet ban.

Eiji helps some of the other kids with their work, to much appreciation, and as the workload lessened, they got to talking again, contemplative.

 

“Do you ever wonder what happened to Aditi, Shorter?” Luciana wondered out loud, sounding melancholy. Eiji’s eyebrows furrowed, and Shorter’s mouth twisted. “Yeah, but we don’t know where she is.”

 

“Do you think that she’s been adopted? That’s what they always say.” Ajit added, hopeful. Tiny looked unconvinced of any of it, and Shorter shakes his head. “I don’t know what happens when they take one of us, but there’s a lot in this building we still don’t know about, right? It’s _huge_ , and they always have orderlies and cameras.”

 

“I can find out,” Eiji finds himself saying. He and Shorter were already planning to pilfer the security layout and blueprints, and if they could find out what happened to the other children, well, maybe so much the better.

 

Luciana turns hopeful eyes on him. Ajit follows suit. Tiny looks worried to hear it, but Shorter’s eyes are now blazing with intent.

 

 _I’m with you, Eiji,_ Eiji hears.

The context is different, but the meaning is the same.

 

•

 

“I should go with you,” Shorter says to Eiji later that night. His hands are twisting the bottom of his shirt, a new nervous gesture, Eiji notes.

 

They’ve retired to Shorter’s room, having bid the other children goodnight. Eiji offers him a smile, trying to assuage him. “It’ll be okay. Even if something happens, one of us will know.”

 

“This is doing _nothing_ to calm me down, Eiji, man. You’re _shit_ at this.”  Shorter’s fidgeting had intensified, even starting to shift his feet.

 

“I know,” Eiji sighs, and huffs out a laugh. “Look, I’ll be back in five minutes. Ten, maybe.”

 

Shorter looks mulish, but it’s only the surface- the closer Eiji looks, the more that it begins to look like real fear on Shorter’s face, and Eiji’s heart cracks at the sight.He grabs Shorter in a hug, much like the night before, and he feels Shorter relax into it, hands tentatively coming to rest on Eiji’s shoulders.

 

“Man, I know what I said last night- what we said, but I don’t want to lose you.” Shorter’s voice sounds very young, and Eiji fights the urge to cry, hearing it. 

 

“I know. I’ll be right back.” He manages.

“You better. Jerk.”

•

 

Eiji cautiously creeps along in the corridor, heart pounding in his chest. He’d been walking for much longer than he anticipated, looking for the office- he reckoned a good place to start would be the office he’d first arrived in, perhaps it would have some clues to where the main office would be.

Oddly, there weren’t as many orderlies walking around right now as usual. By now, he would of reckoned he would of encountered at least three. It was strange: like they had all gone on holiday, or something. 

 

Preoccupied, he nearly misses it: an ajar door.

 

Confused, he looks inside, to no avail as it was pitch black. Cautiously, he steps through the door. His feet make a peculiar sound, like he was stepping on papers. Blindly, he crouches, feels around the floor with his hand, and his knuckles bump into what feels like prescription bottle, when he grabs ahold of it.

 

He stands up cautiously, feeling the beginnings of vertigo. He breathes in, out. No turning back now, he thinks, and feels around for the door handle.

He shuts the door as silently as he can possibly manage, and blindly, fumbles for the light switch.

He looks into the blackness of the room as he does, heart pounding harder than ever. It looks much more foreboding now, like there was someone there, perhaps to grab him.

 

He shakily exhales, and flicks on the light.

 

No one was there.

 

But the entire room was a disaster; papers scattered, furniture askew. There clearly had been a struggle here, and a chill goes down Eiji’s back.

 

Still, no one was here, and while he had the door closed, he might as well look around. Maybe the place had something.

•

 

Eiji went through the filing cabinets of the office- the desk had some documents of interest, but this- _this_ was a bombshell.

 

He’d found the personal backgrounds of every person in CORE in those drawers-He had decided to pull out his friend’s files first, as they were likely to be some of the more recent ones, as they were sorted by year and then by alphabetical.

Shorter’s file was closest to the front, so Eiji takes that, trepidation rising: He flips it open, and a small snapshot of a much smaller, wiry-looking Shorter glared up at him, determined-looking and gaunt, obviously underfed. He looked very different than he had in the picture in his room: possibly this was taken after tragedy had struck. 

 

 _Liam Wong,_ the paper read: _Bombing of shelter successful. Extraction from New York City completed._

 

Something awful caught in Eiji’s chest, and he found it difficult to breath. _(Nadia flashes in his mind’s eye, smiling up from Shorter’s dresser, a thousand miles away from him)_

And hands shaking, a new fear strikes him. He tears through the files, desperate to find his own folder. 

 

When he finally finds it, his fears are confirmed.

 

 _Eiji Nakamura_ , it reads:

 

_Execution of targets Aiko Nakamura and Yuki Nakamura, successful. Extraction from Western Springs complete._

 

A choked-out scream wrests itself out from Eiji’s throat, and he sinks to his knees, staring at the awful words. They begin to blur and slide before him, and hot tears begin rolling down his face.

He hardly notices the footsteps behind him, and when by the time he registers that he is no longer alone, a hand seizes him, wrapping a cloth around his nose and mouth. He struggles, trying not to breath it in- but it is no use, eventually he accidentally breathes enough of the substance in, sour and thick on his tongue. 

His vision fades to black. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to my wonderful beta Moneera-87, who carefully reads it through, listens to me when I need to talk it out and inspires me every day! And to every commenter, kudos-giver, subscriber, bookmarker and every reader- I love you guys, man.


	6. Volume One, Part Four

Eiji hovers between sleep and the waking world.

 _Jerk_ , he hears, clear as a bell, as if it was spoken right in his ear.

 

Hazy images slide through his mind’s eye, like oil floating on water, iridescent and wavering.

 

 _I’m_ _sorry_ , _Shorter_ , Eiji thinks, and lies where he is in the darkness of near-sleep, immobile, unable to move.

 

More images float by: ( _A_ _grassy_ _plain_ , _lonely_ _and_ _desolate_ \- _despite_ _the_ _vibrant_ _greens_ _and_ _yellows_ _of_ _the_ _grass_ _and_ _the_ _clarity_ _of_ _the_ _blue_ _sky_ , _it_ _is_ _not_ _beautiful_ _to_ _him_ : _still_ , _he_ _is_ _not_ _trapped_ here, _even_ _if_ _it_ _feels_ _like_ _it_ )

When he tries to hold the image, it melts away like snow under the sun, and it is lost.

•

When Eiji comes to, he is lying on a flat, hard surface, and his mouth feels like it’s filled with cotton. Reflexively, he tries to spit, but nothing comes. 

After a little eternity, he props himself up on his elbow, and shakes his head, trying to dispel the feeling of his entire head stuffed with wool. In doing so, his head hits metal, and though he cringes from the blow, the pain chases away some of the drowsiness: at last, his focus is clear.

 

Oh.

 

Eiji stares at the sight before him, mute with shock.

 

He.... is in a cage?

 

He stares at the bars before him,motionless.

Images pour back into his head, like the rushing of a pitcher of water-

_(CORE had killed my parents- I was discovered- I wanted to find out what happened to the other children—-) The mental images of the eyes of the other children, Luciana, Ajit and Tiny float to the forefront, dark and pleading. The concerned eyes of Shorter, old and tired in his new face; I don’t want to lose the only family I’ve found, it says)_

 

Rage bubbles up in him, acidic.

 

Between the slats of his bars, he can make out the legs of what looked like a long metal table, and nearby, the wheels of an operating cart.

A cold certainty settles heavily in his gut, but instead of quelling his anger, it feeds all the more, like petrol thrown upon flame.

 

He does not think that the children lived for very long after being taken.

 

Someone nearby is screaming like they’re wounded- or with rage, like the whole building would shake with it-

Oni, he hears, making out words. You demons, leeches—

It’s him screaming, and finally, his focus snaps back to himself, and falls silent.

 

He does not weep.

• 

“Eiji?” 

A familiar voice calls his name, chasing Eiji out of a dreamless sleep and into the waking world.

Eiji blinks for a while, trying to place the voice. Then he sits up abruptly, banging his head upon the low ceiling of the cage- in the same place.

He holds his head where it was struck, gritting his teeth until the urge to express pain had passed. “Cheok-Ying?” He calls, wary.

“Kid! Are you okay?” 

Eiji blinks, a vague sense of incredulity settling on him. “Just how- Does looks okay to you?” He asks, unable to help himself. Suspicious, he asks: “Where are you? Are you with them?”

“Can you see me?” Cheok-Ying asks from somewhere above him. His voice is softer, more gentle. Eiji hates it. It reminds him of the day he had left Chicago. You brought me here, he thinks to himself, bitter. “No.”

“Try peek through your bars. To your left, in the back.” 

Eiji grits his teeth, but does so.

Cheok-Ying looks nearly unrecognizable from the friendly-looking man he knew. His left eye is swollen shut, purple. A lump is rising near his temple— and like Eiji, he is also in a cage, but much more badly cramped and stuffed in than Eiji. He’d be surprised if the older man could so much as unfurl his knees from his chest about three inches. 

“Hey, kiddo. How’d you get here?” And for the first time, he notices how rough the other man’s voice sounds. Sympathy rises in Eiji, unbidden.

“What _happened_ to you?” 

A long silence follows, Cheok-Ying’s expression inscrutable.

“I... think I got mixed up in something that I shouldn’t of.” He says, finally. He looks to be far away from the moment, and- Eiji doesn’t know what to feel, looking at the bruises blooming before him, like terrible flowers upon the man’s arms, knuckles. 

“That... makes two of us.” 

Cheok-Ying laughs, harsh and deep from his chest, rusty-sounding.

 

“What can you tell me?” Eiji asks, but Cheok-Ying ignores this. “Where are we?” Cheok-Ying asks, eyes darting around, trying to look around the edges of Eiji’s cage.

 

“... Don’t you know?”

 

Cheok-Ying begins shaking his head, then appears to thinks better of it. “I haven’t been here before.”

Eiji sucks in a breath.

“... This is where the missing children go.” 

Cheok-Ying turns ashen underneath his injuries. “I thought...” he begins, and trails off.

Eiji waits for him to continue. “... Thought that they were being taken back out into the world again. That we were implementing safety measures that would ensure they wouldn’t talk, but that they’d go on to live a more peaceful life.”

Silence falls heavily around them upon hearing this revelation.

 

“I... don’t think they lived for very long after you brought them here,” Eiji whispers, a mere phantom of sound.

 

It doesn’t matter: Cheok-Ying’s face crumples like paper.

 

Watching the older man weep for the children he had shepherded, Eiji feels the last of his resentment towards the older man being swept away in a current of sympathy. 

An eternity passes between them, silence only broken by the soft sobs.

• 

Long hours later, when the silence had truly become absolute, Eiji asks:

 

“Did you know? About CORE?”

A long pause. Just when Eiji is beginning to think that the older man is sleeping, Cheok-Ying answers him.

“What do you mean?” 

“You asked me why I was here. I found something.”

Cheok-Ying’s good eye opens, still swollen from tears, but the light in them is dark and intelligent, alight with curiosity.

“Yeah?” 

Like ripping off a bandaid, Eiji thinks. Though this revelation would be more significantly painful.

“... My parents were killed by CORE,” Eiji states flatly. “It’s no accident, how we were brought here. We were harvested.”

•

_(An unknown amount of time passes.)_

“There is nothing yet to say that it will definitively produce AQUARIUS-“ Eiji comes back to consciousness, slowly. Wherever he is now, it is feels very bright. His throat feels scraped raw, face stiff from dried tears and his head is beginning to pound. How long has he been here? 

He blinks into the lights, blinded. Moving around, he finds that he is now strapped the operating table, rough cloth biting into his wrists and ankles, and furiously, he begins to fight his restraints, much to the dismay of those present. Hands press on him, and in the corner of his vision, he sees a needle being prepared. 

No, he thinks with horror. I can’t- I don’t want to. _(Mother’s blood drips off of the table onto the green carpet) (“His dad was shot dead in the bathroom, Christ’s sake-“) (Ash, smiling at him in a New York flat-) (Ash overlooking the city skyline- his chest hurts sometimes when he looks at him)_

 _Ash,_ he thinks with anguish. It is like shouting into the void, helpless and reaching. _I want to see you, I can’t die before-_  

A needle sinks into him, and he falls into blackness.

• 

 _Earlier_ _that_ _day_ : 

Shorter Wong wakes up the next morning with a start, heart pounding in his chest.

Was that a closing of the door he had heard? Pulse rising, he looks towards his door. Nothing. No Eiji.

He rolls upright in his bed. Five or ten minutes, Eiji had said then, eyes tense with concern- for him. Eiji hadn’t come back after five or ten minutes. Or twenty, or an hour, or now, apparently- the night, and it seemed now, that it was true- Eiji would never be coming back. 

Shorter puts his face in his hands, and bitterly, he silently cursed himself for letting Eiji be such a hard head. He should of gone with him. 

A thin thread of hope remained- maybe Eiji had just gone to sleep in his room and would be at breakfast now, waiting for Shorter.

Scrambling, Shorter gets dressed, stomach sick with anxiety. 

•

Shorter searches for Eiji in the sea of people. Nothing. No familiar, smiling black eyes, fluffy black hair: Shorter spots Luciana in line at one point, and urgently tells her the news: her ash-brown eyes widening in alarm, then they darkened, sharpened, and she nodded seriously, mouth twisting, promising to tell him if she saw Eiji, and to keep her updated.

Shorter tears through the crowd, and his nerves burned with fear, like a wick drenched in oil, caught light.

Eiji had been a good friend to him, until the very end- and again, _again_ he had failed him. Angrily scrubbing tears from his eyes, Shorter tears out of the cafeteria and heads to Eiji’s room. 

• 

Shorter stands in the middle of his friend’s room- it is empty of Eiji. 

Heart pounding, mouth dry he goes to sit on his friend’s bed. The bed is neatly made, unslept in.

Unable to face the reality, Shorter puts his head in his hands, and tries to ignore how the room spins. Think, man. Eiji needs you right now. 

He only has a small amount of time before class, now- he’d have to skip breakfast. What could he do? He could carefully pick through security, true, but trying to retrace his friend’s steps would be a nightmare, and take too long while he was trying to dodge cameras. 

He could... ask for help. 

•

Eiji dreams, as the scientists work on him. 

_He is flying, but not under his own power; the great flap of monstrous wings echoes around him: but he is not scared._

_“I won’t ask you to stay forever,” Ash says to him, voice like a great bell ringing, clear but melodious; “but will you stay for now?”_  

 _“Forever,” Eiji replies, and though his voice is lost in the wind, he feels Ash, warm as an embrace against him, and they_ soar.

• 

Meanwhile in class, Shorter is attempting to reconcile himself to the idea that he’s basically going to have to ask his classmates to organize a coup. Guilt and anticipation curled and fought in his gut like snakes.

If he was being perfectly transparent with himself, he was just out of other ideas. 

He would’ve snuck after Eiji, but his friend had become pretty damn fine at sneaking around, avoiding cameras like it was his job and frankly, Shorter couldn’t do better than him. They were pretty equal in skill for that. So if they had caught Eiji, Shorter probably would be caught, too. So. That left... a distraction.

 

Not just any distraction. CORE was a very organized, meticulous place- and they trained child soldiers; they were likely equipped to deal with some unruly ones. But on the other hand, a riot...

Shorter sighs inaudibly, staring down at his work without seeing it.

 

He hated CORE. Hated their exploitation of children. Right now, he was beginning to hate himself, too.

•

In quite another classroom, Luciana is similarly mulling over the problem of Eiji, hands twisting in her lap. The teacher, used to competence on her behalf, did not pay much attention to her, instead focusing on more well-known inattentive students. She stared as the ruler came down on one student’s desk, making them jump. Under most circumstances, she would likely pity them. Instead, it barely registered.

Eiji. Boy dilemma, she thinks to herself. Courageous to a fault, maybe- she remembers his words from the night before, thinking it was very brave and kind of him to even say those words out loud, before. She wasn’t thinking that he was going to, perhaps act on those feelings so soon. She had no proof that he did, of course- but given the circumstances, she was inclined to think that he had gone into danger upon their behalf- the other children’s behalf.

She still hadn’t seen Eiji, and while that meant nothing, she had never seen him attending one of her classes; in her gut, she felt that she never would, indeed see him again- unless she did something.

She had done nothing before, when the first child she knew disappeared. Emily, with the skin like midnight and a smile like sunshine- her first, almost-friend. She had done nothing then, petrified that she was next, lost and hopeless without Abuelo. She hadn’t seen Emily again. Then it was Andrew, who had a loud mouth, rude as a fire was hot- gone one day, and never came back. It wasn’t only in her age group, either; others went, too and when anyone asked the teachers- they either were met with a steady retelling of the standard line- that they were in a better place, or they, too disappeared.

Rumor was still persistent- but after a while, children knew not to ask.

She’d never heard of anyone who wanted to _find_ them.

It had lit a little determined fire in her heart, like a campfire that people had almost given up on making, sputtering and flickering to life. 

Now, though- doubt was seeping into her heart.

Eiji wasn’t exactly a novice at combat- she doubted if she could even fight them off, unlike him. She was a fine shot at sniping, but hand to hand and the rest of it-

 

She stills in her fidgeting, surprised at herself.

 

What was she thinking? A voice whispered in her, doubtful. Was she already thinking about rescuing a boy that she just met?

Her lips turn down and flatten, and steel shines bright in her heart, like the sureness of a guillotine, almost- surprising herself. 

She already had made her decision; the answer was already- from the moment she had seen Shorter’s face, white with worry-

 

 _Yes_.

• 

Luciana nearly plows into Shorter in her haste to find him. The much smaller boy holds his arms out, trying to steady them both. His face still looks grey with anxiety, and her heart twists to see it, but he tries for a smile. Other children mill around them, uncaring, chattering away.

“Slow down there, cowboy,” Shorter says to her, barely audible over the din, and despite herself, she snorts. Then more seriously, she reaches out to feel his forehead. That coloring was pretty severe-looking, especially in the blue light of the hallways. The motion startles him, and his hands slip away from her shoulders in an effort to back away. She pauses mid-motion, and the moment passes. She drops her hand.

Shorter’s eyes are looking at her with a tinge of wariness now.

“I haven’t seen Eiji,” she begins, and watches Shorter’s face crumple and fold. At the sight of this she hastily stated: “I want to find him.”

Shorter blinks up at her, clearly astonished. An invisible weight seems to lift off his shoulders. She is relieved to see it, and smiles at him.

“You do?” 

• 

Shorter, she finds, is a unexpected little general of sorts.

Finding the others had been easy enough- they had all agreed to help once they found one another at dinner time, Ajit practically chomping at the bit- she knew that the disappearances had never really sat well with him, and once there had been a group consensus, it seemed that he was perfectly raring and fit to go. Seeing such enthusiasm made her feeling of brief, earlier hesitation small and foolish, and she smiled to herself, feeling happy that she had made the right choice, as scary as it initially had seemed. 

However, what Shorter was proposing was much larger than what she had been envisioning.

“We need to create a diversion,” Shorter stated, pacing back and forth. He seemed hardly aware of their presence, and yet intensely focused upon all of them, in his way.

Ajit furrowed his brows, and raised his hand, like they were in class. Shorter points at him. “Go.”

“We haven’t covered diversionary tactics, in what we’ve been taught.” I know you haven’t, Ajit leaves unsaid.

Shorter blinks, clearly taken aback, then slowly recovers. “History does.”

 

“What?”

 

Tiny kicks Ajit’s foot none-too-gently, and Ajit yelps and glares in bewilderment at Tiny, who is looking unusually impatient. “Just let Shorter talk, Ajit. We can ask questions later.”

Ajit, taken aback from this unusual display from the gentle giant, falls silent. Shorter coughs into his fist, a strangely adult gesture, and they fall silent.

“Thanks, Tiny. So as I was saying,” and Shorter stops pacing, lets out a long exhale.

“We need a diversion. Something that will attract all the hands on-deck possible so that a few of us-or one of us can go after Eiji. Otherwise, the risk of not succeeding is too high. They’ve controlled us well enough by being able to pick us off one-on-one...And through fear.” 

Silence. Luciana knows what Shorter’s saying is true, knows it in her gut.

In a voice that sounds quite unlike hers, she asks: “What do you need for us to do?” 

•

Cheok-Ying is somewhere beyond the realm of grief as he watches the kid he’d brought to CORE lie, white and motionless underneath the bright lights. Tears shed were worse than nothing for that little figure, who was so still he barely appeared to be breathing. Guilt was like a rough sea he was busy treading, buffeted by the endless currents and waves.

Christ. He’d...

 

 _“Hey, Kiddo. Didja pack everything?_ ” He watches the Japanese kid nod, so young, lost in the world.

He felt for him, as he had felt for every single child he had the duty of protecting, ferrying. He’d been that child once, after all; and before he knows it, he’s reached out to ruffle the kid’s fluffy, spiky hair- asian hair like his grew thick and bristly and up, much like a shoebrush. _“I know everything must be scary for you. I’m sorry about your parents._ ”

Flashes of other little, lost faces come to him, all of those little charges who were recently orphaned, devastated by the loss of their parents.

( _Dr. Firenze smiles at him, a young Cheok-Ying, with nothing and no one in the world_

_He’d had his parents taken, too- just like that_

_Cheok-Ying had been working for murderers, monsters after all.)_

The legs of Dr. Firenze flash into his mind, and their monstrosity barely registers, against the tidal wave of grief.

He’d no tears left in him, and yet his breath shuddered and sobbed.

•

If he was being perfectly honest with himself, Yut-Lung wasn’t sure why he was doing this, possibly haring after a desperate man’s attempt at contact. Perhaps it was the promise of danger.

Perhaps, in his own way he had silently clung to the thought Eiji Okumura after Ash- the physical reminder of Ash. 

Somewhere in his office, the books that Eiji had published were gathering dust underneath boxes of documents. It was strange- at the time, he found that he couldn’t bear to not own them, and then, he couldn’t bear to look at them.

It was a strange impulse. But people did collect things they never looked at again. Memories. Photos. Jewelry, at times.

And then Eiji Okumura had died.

The week that he had died was seared into Yut-Lung’s brain. Sing was nearly inconsolable; he did not cry in front of Yut-Lung, but he drifted like a man lost, a ghost left behind. Yut Lung himself had felt... empty. 

That was the word: empty. He’d dealt with the grief, over the years of a peership-that-never-was, with the only man he respected- Ash and then, when Eiji had died, joined Ash wherever he was- only then he realized how much comfort he had taken in the Japanese boy’s existence. 

Because as much as he hurt, he still kept going. Both of them.

But Eiji’s eyes remained haunted, even as Yut-Lung drew together his empire. Eiji was comfortable to be a ghost of his own past, drifting the streets of the city.

And when he died, he had taken the last of those days with him. 

Yut-Lung wonders why he feels so disturbed at the idea that Eiji was indeed, still alive. It would make some sense, after all that he perhaps did not wish to remain in the city: Sing had hinted that Eiji wished to stop grieving.

... But deep in his gut, Yut-Lung believed that the only way Eiji would stop grieving would be if he joined Ash. Love was for children, but if what they had was indeed love, then it was..

Blanca flashes through his mind- a face, a thought he hadn’t had for years- 

Separating the two would be disastrous, Blanca had warned Yut-Lung, who was young and foolish, and lost in a world that did not love.

Yut-Lung chuckles bitterly to himself. How right Blanca was; it had destroyed Eiji. And how bitter it was that if their situations had been reversed, it would of been Ash who was destroyed.

He now held no illusions that Ash would of been alright without his other half: Ash would have turned into his name sake- a bright flame that had burned itself into ash, for a dead man. He would of been worse than a dead-man walking.

And now, he was supposedly going to rescue a dead man, on nothing to go on but a hunch and some coordinates. And a message.

 

“Gate 30 boarding. Flight 109 John F. Kennedy Airport to Dullas Airport now accepting passengers.”

•

Cheok-Ying listens for Eiji’s breathing. He can’t see him, but they wouldn’t put a dead body into a cage, right?

Somehow, he doesn’t think that they’ll be fed- he wishes, then, fiercely that he could reach through his bars and comfort the kid in some way.

 

“Kid?”

No answer.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for waiting so patiently! I’ve been working on this for the past few months now, lol. All of your comments and feedback really kept me going, so thank you so much. I hope you enjoyed!
> 
> As always, thank you so much to my beta Moneera-87! & without you to agonize over BF with I’m not sure where I and this fic would be LOL


	7. Volume One, Part Five

 

From the perspective of Dr. Firenze, it was a mostly ordinary morning. Business as usual, he thinks and blows out smoke between clenched teeth.

 

He watches it unfurl into the crisp fall air, reflective. His lab coat wasn’t nearly warm enough for the temperatures, but he didn’t give enough of a damn to care. Watching the light rise over the trees was the only pleasure he got in this place- except for the occasional breakthrough in their work.

Speaking of which: They had Dr. Achaius’s pet project currently in captivity, after catching him in the dead of night, the little rat-spoiling some plans-and just earlier that day, they had brought in Fir, or whatever his unpronounceable Chinese name was- detestable man.

Boy always had such high hopes for the sheep that they had culled to bring to CORE.

His naïveté was incredible, really, Firenze thinks to himself. And to avoid problems, he was usually put on the shepherding rotation. He sometimes stuck around the facility, usually to Firenze’s dismay.

 Most of the children here were little pigs being raised for slaughter, to Firenze- some were raised to be spies, some lucky few would go to NASA, and frankly, quite a few of them would be sold off to offshore groups- mercenaries, foreign governments, mafia, and the list went on. And so what if a handful of here and there disappeared?

 

He doubted that anyone would be receiving thanks for their blood-soaked scientific results, but he couldn’t care less for gratitude.

He inhaled, dragging on his cigarette. The dawn was rising, golden and harsh, washing out the color of the trees.

He rather doubted that Fir would yield any particularly special advancement, as children usually were the ones to do so, hence their facility being set up in the first place. There would have to be... something special for him.

 

Now, Dr. Achaius’s little pet project promised to be exciting- he was already anticipating it.

 A humorless grin twitched at the corner of his mouth, and his pocket buzzed.

Digging it out, the PC read: 

“Lee Family Head coming to look for recruits today. Heads up: Will be stopping nearby some of your facilities.”

 

Achaius grunted. Well, maybe it wouldn’t be such a quiet morning, after all.

 

•

 

Eiji dreams inside the cage.

 

New York is different- a giant, living thing, the electricity a pulsing lifeblood, the people who walk it’s streets the soul and the cells of the body. His head is filled and overwhelmed with it: It is the flap of a thousand pigeons taking flight, the lost words of the cabbies shouting in the streets, a single rat that scurries, unseen across the humming lines of steel in the subway corridors-

 

Eiji wakes, shuddering and gasping, like he’d been drowning, and does not remember the dream.

 

•

 

Ba-bump. Ba-bump.

 

People move before Shorter, but he barely registers them. He’s too anxious, he dimly realizes.

 Tiny nudges him underneath the table. Are you okay? The touch asks, though in reality, Tiny’s eyelashes barely flicker in his direction- a tell, but one too discreet to be noticed by any cameras.

 Ba-bump.

Shorter shakes his head, and doesn’t know if he’s saying, “I’m not okay,” or “I’m okay.”

 Tiny smiles reassuringly at his food, gesture obviously meant for Shorter, and upon the sight of it, an irrepressible burst of fondness came to Shorter.

A burst of pain around his ankle. Luciana’s kicked him in addition, none-too-gently, and judging by the grimace on her face, the level of force behind it was unintended.

Humor lifts the haze around him, despite his stinging ankle, and the roar of the cafeteria returns to normal.

 

Two hours, thirty minutes to go.

 

•

 

Yut-Lung gazes down in disgust at the receptionist, having, after a very long car ride arrived at the facility where the man claiming to be Eiji Okumura alleged that he was being kept. The coordinates had, in fact led him to a shady facility-it reminded him, oddly of a colosseum. Something to do with the circular structure, he thinks.

And right now, Yut-Lung would bet several left nuts, (none being his own) that the receptionist was being difficult on _purpose_.

She gazes up at him, implacable, unreadable. What an unfortunate, pathetic, dowdy little thing she was, he thinks, a light sneer curling his lip. Norma Jean, read her name placard, and the obvious alias irritated him. Like anyone wouldn’t know Marylin Monroe’s real name was, and gritted his teeth.

 She breaks the eye contact to mark something or the other on her desk. “As I’ve said, Dr. Florentine will be showing you around. It is no trouble.”

They wanted to put a minder on him, did they? That suited him just fine.

He smiled tightly at her.

 

•

 

Eiji stares blearily at the lights. He’d woken up on the operating table at some point....he thinks. He wonders why he’s alive. Wasn’t this the way they utilized, disposed of the children?

 

“Cheok...Ying...?” He croaks.

 

“Kid?” Cheok-Ying sounds just as hoarse, though it sounds like he’d been weeping. “Need... water,” Eiji’s throat feels like it’s sandpaper.

 

No answer.

 

After a while, There is the sound of a key turning in a lock- then, dragging something heavily on the floor.

 Legs and feet come into his peripheral vision.

 

 •

 

Shorter’s breath feels very loud, in the silence of the infirmary- his throat feels raw, dully aching from acid. He’d forced himself to vomit on Luciana and Ajit earlier, excusing all three of them from watchful supervision to clean themselves- and for Shorter, to execute the first stage of the plan.

 He stares down at the unconscious nurse below.

The man’s eyelashes are very blonde against his pasty, freckled cheekbones; If it weren’t for the fast-purpling forehead, one could be forgiven for thinking he was merely sleeping.

Shorter runs his hands together, nearly absent. His hand is stinging from the amount of force he’d applied to to the man’s head; He’d swung his whole body weight into it, trying to mimic a grown man’s thrust.

He struggled not to feel guilty at the nameless figure, looking at him, trying to judge if he was still breathing. He had played the nurse for a fool, playing sick on the floor so he could get him to the right height; The man had gone down like a lead weight.

It wasn’t a lethal hit. Just... a concussion.

“Sorry about this, but I’ve got Eiji to save,” he breathes, and crouches down to rifle through the man’s pockets.

•

“You owe me one,” Luciana mutters to herself darkly, shaking her hand to try abate the sting. Clenched in her other hand was the precious key-card.

Christ, she was glad she was informed as she was- she was pretty sure she’d have to throw away this shirt.

It was certainly effective, what Shorter did, even though it was disgusting, and she glares down at the liquid sitting on her shirt. 

Ajit was unusually quiet next to her. The smell of vomit was sour between them.

Luciana sighs, looks down upon the unconscious security guards. “Come on. We don’t have much time.”

 

•

 

Yut-Lung’s not quite sure of what he’s seeing. Peering through the window door, unbeknownst to the children before him, he’s watching the instructor silently give them... what appears to be _real_ specs of a rocky terrain somewhere perhaps in Afghanistan. He can see the little print of military official’s name, badly smudged on the projector.

The instructor is mouthing something. Yut-Lung can’t make it out. He’s not sure if he wants to. 

He feels numb as he watches the hands go up. They couldn’t be more than twelve.

Eiji Okumura, what did you do to land yourself here?

The doctor’s voice in the hallway is articulating something, but all he hears is a dull roaring sound.

 

• 

Luciana jogs with Ajit, feet pounding on the carpeted flooring, her shoulder aching with every bounce, three keycards in her pocket. A delicate tendril of doubt was belatedly rising in her, fast followed by a kind of self-aware terror. Was she _really_ the kind of person who knocked out people? Even bad people? Clenching her teeth, she rounded the corridor. When she had entered arms training, even then, there was kind of a bloodless feeling to it.

 

This... was _real._

 

But, she thinks, slowing to a quick trot as their next destination was upon them, was she the kind of person who just sat back as innocent people just disappeared around her?

 

•

 

Tiny’s not quite sure how he’s landed himself in this situation, is all. His heart is pounding, still from the act of preparing what he did in the kitchen. 

He stares down at his notebook, rigid, not quite seeing it. 

He hated bullies. What he did- it wasn’t that he was one. He wasn’t. This was _necessary._

He’d never sat easy, when his classmates disappeared- but he was afraid to do anything, because of Jack. Jack would leap to the other children’s defense, easy. He was the righteous one between the two of them; Jack would surely ask what happened to the others. And Tiny nearly did tell him, once.

Except that the boy who kicked up a fuss had disappeared.

No one said anything after that, too afraid to be the next one. Still, other kids, from other classes had gone missing. And as ever, the staff had turned a blind eye.

Some had wondered if the staff really did know anything.

But Tiny knew.

There was a man in his village that his mother told him to stay away from. When animals, livestock, pets had gone missing, people would ask the neighbors if they had seen the animal.

No one would go near the man’s house to

ask, all the way at the end of the road.

Tiny had run into him once, at the market- literally. He’d dropped his fruit basket, and the produce had rolled around on the ground. When he happened to look into the man’s eyes-

 

The flat look in the man’s eyes was the same as the staffers.

 

•

 

Yut-Lung is disguised as a passer-by in a large, lonely-feeling city. He can see his breath, though he isn’t cold.

He’s currently entered in a simulation of cat-and-mouse; a terrified looking girl, runs towards him, fawn-colored hair whipping behind her. There’s blood on her skirt.

Suddenly the expression on the girl’s face changes, and she slows; A flat bored look appears, only betrayed by the clench in her jaw as she melts into passerby, obscuring her from view. Five seconds later, she stuffs her blood-stained skirt, (he glimpses ripped seams) and matching jacket into her purse; she has become a tired-looking gym rat, wearing a headset. She’s scraping her hair into a ponytail, and within moments, she disappears into the hole of a Metro.

A pack of boys skidded to a stop before Yut-Lung, with expressions of clear confusion.

 

•

 

“Isn’t that the newest frag bomb?” Yut-Lung hissed to himself. There’s various parts of the bomb strewn about the class, all of whom looked tired, grimy and dirty. The boy nearest him had a long smudge of oil across his face, nearly reaching his eye.

There is a greedy look that flashes across the instructor’s features, just over their bowed heads.

•  

 

In the midst of his shock, Yut-Lung is reminded that somewhere, Eiji Okumura was supposedly held captive.

Doctor, doctor, doctor. Many of the staff he ran into had worn white coats- in fact, so was his “guide.”

And yet, all they had shown him were militaristic options. How curious, Yut-Lung thinks with a shred of irony, sharp and glittering in his mind.

He smiles.

“I’m curious to know what other options your children have, other than militaristic training.”

The narrow side eye he got from the woman tickled him. Nosy intruder, it said.

It melted away soon enough into polite affability, which irritated him. “Oh? Your inquiry had stated otherwise.”

There was no such thing, and Yut-Lung knew it. All he had sent in to the facility upon finding out that it was a recruitment center was that he was coming to look for potential recruits.

 

His smile was all teeth.

 

•

 

“Shorter?”

 

Shorter’s head rises from the bathroom sink, dripping wet. His eyes look ancient, sunken, reflected in the mirror.

Ajit’s breathing is heavy behind her, and the sound of the dripping water echoes off of the walls.

“Here,” she says dumbly, holding out a card.

Shorter takes it silently.

Luciana is beginning to be scared of the silence- of that look in Shorter’s eyes. He looks- like Abuelo, days before he’d died. Like he’s willing to do anything, go anywhere.

Then arms enfold both her and Ajit, and Ajit squawks with surprise.

 

“Listen-“

 

•

 

Yut-Lung’s not quite sure of the sight he’s been greeted with.

A young man’s head is being prepared to be operated on- ethnicity seemed Chinese, if he’d had to guess; Punti maybe- and a young, Japanese child, that looks eerily like Eiji in the way that he’s currently screaming and shouting- he’s forcibly reminded of the time he’d spent in the same proximity with the man in the same bed as Dino Golzine-

“What’s all this?” Yut-Lung asks imperiously, folding his arms.

The surgeons stop in their movements; but it’s not them he’s looking at.

The little boy has stopped screaming. His face is transformed. He’s looking at Yut-Lung with- _recognition_.

Yut Lung makes his decision, striding over the the cage. The surgeons seem to be too in shock with the sudden turn of events to stop him- or even return to operations.

“Stand back,” he warns the child, and the child silently shuffled back into a corner of the cage, not taking his eyes off of Yut-Lung. Yes, that was the familiar line of determination in his mouth.

Yut Lung pulls out a laser- one of his newer acquisitions and like a knife through butter,cuts through the lock.

 

What follows next-

The child bursts through the door of the cage and with a running leap, jumps on one of the surgeons, seizing a scalpel from slack handsBlood sprays across the unconscious man on the table. The little boy had transformed into a demon, tearing into the mortals present with abandon. The screams echoed off of the walls.

 

There are tears rolling down the little one’s face.

 

•

 

The black smoke from the kitchen is pouring in fast, hot and thick. Luciana gets nearly punched out by another classmate, who barely seemed to even recognize her existence.

Her eyes are stinging, and she’s already starting to cough. People are beginning to crush one another on the way out of the cafeteria. One head goes down, falling beneath the panicked stampede- and another.

A siren begins to wail.

She climbs to the top of her table, where the smoke is thickest. Eyes watering, shaking with adrenaline, she pulls out the hijacked PA microphone, the little one used only in emergencies from her back pocket.

This is it, she thinks, wildly. “STUDENTS AT CORE,” her voice booms over the speakers. “PLEASE REMAIN CALM.” She has to break to cough. A thousand eyes stare back at her, and the screaming had nearly died out- perhaps out of surprise. “FILE OUT IN AN ORDERLY MANNER. FIND STAFFERS- TEACHERS- ANY ADULT YOU SEE AND PLEASE ASK THEM WHAT TO DO ABOUT THE PROBLEM. THANK YOU.” Oh god, I just made this up as I went.

They seem to obey. The crowding evens out, but the screams have turned into sobs. 

•

The sirens have already started.

 Shorter can barely breath for all the people surrounding him, and in his heart, he’s beginning to lose hope. He still hasn’t found Eiji.

 •

 

Silence, heavy as anything that Yut-Lung ever had to endure sits in the operating room.

Bodies litter the room, surrounding them both- and the young man on the table sleeps on, chest rising and falling, unknowing.

“Did you kill them?” Yut-Lung queries of the child, wary.

 

The little head shakes. No.

 

•

 

“Ajit!” Luciana yells, fighting through the crowding in the halls. The screams have returned- people who hadn’t heard her earlier.

Ajit sights her- they fight to get to each other.

Where’s Tiny? Where’s Eiji & Shorter now? Luciana thinks desperately, grasping Ajit’s wrist, gripping tight. Ajit is pale and drawn, eyes wild.

 

“We need to go,” Ajit says, in a voice quite unlike himself. Luciana nods dumbly, unable to come to grips with reality. She has no idea wether they’ve failed or not- wether Shorter or Eiji have succeeded. Or if either one of them have survived.

But right now, it’s their necks on the line- hers, Ajit’s, Tiny’s. Heart in her throat, she utters a quick prayer to the Virgen de Guadalupe that they’d all managed to blend with the crowds.

 

They let themselves be swept away.

 

•

 

“Here,” Ajit croaks, pointing with his free hand. “Over here. This is where they throw away the trash from the kitchen.”

Saved, Luciana thinks. The relief is incredible.

“Shorter told me, before. It should have a ladder.” Ajit half-smiles, but it’s shaky.

 

They fight from the crowd, and they rest in a corner.

“I’ll try it first, okay? Then I’ll come back and tell you what the door outside is like.”

Ajit nods in acquiesce, trembling.

 

•

 

Luciana climbs into the chute. She thinks it’s very large, though it was dark inside- you could probably throw a loveseat down here easily enough.

She sneezes. It’s surprisingly lacking in smell, for a garbage chute- kind of dusty.

 

•

Something white on the ladder catches the corner of her eye, and she turns.

 

It’s a hand, reaching out for her.

She swallows a scream.

 

Wanting to look anywhere else, Luciana looks down.

•

 

The crowd is gone. It makes him feel naked; like surely someone will come to find him, standing alone in the corridor, gormless.

 

Then he hears it.

 

“Ajit, Ajit,” Ajit hears through the door of the chute. It’s Luciana calling, though it’s with a terror that Ajit’s never heard before.

 It shakes him, in a way that the day hadn’t already. He opens it, cautiously.

Luciana’s face, completely drained of color stares back at him. Her eyes are wide and dark with terror. And before he knows it, she’s climbing back out. “We- we can’t go down,” she says, trembling.

 

“Why?”

 

“Listen, Ajit.”

 

Ajit puts his ear close to the chute. A long howl, like that of a monstrous beast answers him. He shakes his head, a vague sense of unreality settling over him. “The wind?”

“It’s not wind, Ajit.” Luciana says, next to him. Her face is still white with terror.

 A surge of heat blasts through the chute, and in his surprise, Ajit lets go of the door. 

As they stand there, the howling becomes muffled screams, just audible under the sound of the siren.

•

 

“It’s good to see you, even under these circumstances,” Eiji extends his hand, feeling suddenly tired. Yut-Lung has aged well, as he’d always suspected- grown into his looks, rather than out of them. White peppered his long hair, evidence of a stressful life lived.

 

Yut-Lung extends a thin white hand out of his silken sleeve. It shines blue and green, shifting under the cold light. Eiji’s blood-covered hand meets his, staining.

 

“Eiji Okumura?” Yut-Lung’s lip curls just slightly, and Eiji feels a twinge of amusement upon seeing the familiar sight.

 

“That’s me.”

 

The older, Chinese man narrows his eyes.

“ _Explain._ ”

•

 

“Shorter! Shorter!”

 

God, it’s so hot. Wasn’t it only supposed to be smoke? There couldn’t be a real fire, right?

Screams echoed around him- across the carpeted floor, bouncing off of the walls. It was like scene from hell.

He’d caused this

 

He’d caused... all of this.

“SHORTER!” A burst of pain across his temple. Someone’s hit him.

“Shorter!!” A hand lands on his shoulder- he turns.

 

Eiji stares back at him. A blood spatter runs across his face, stark against a bone-white complexion.

For the first time- Shorter’s reaction to his friend is _fear._

 

“Shorter?”

 

Eiji’s eyes are dark with concern. Bags sit under his eyes, black and purpling, like day-old bruises.

 

Shorter-can’t breath. He can’t breath.

 

Eiji’s pulling him out of the crowd, setting them in a corner.

A small eternity passes where Shorter looks listlessly at the crowd, passing by- Eiji is whispering to him to breathe, in and out.

Finally, reality comes, and the roar of sound returns to him.

 

Shorter looks down into his arms. They’ve been sitting in a crouch, both of them- and he feels very, very tired.

He looks at Eiji, next to him; Eiji looks nothing like the boy he met in the past life- and all too familiar, even down to the clench of his jaw. He is currently looking at Shorter with something that looks a lot like love and concern.

 

His heart aches.

 

There isn’t just blood across Eiji’s face. It’s down his arms, even all the way down to his bare feet, from what he can see.

 

“Is it...?” All yours?

 

Eiji looks confused for a moment-Shorter must’ve asked too quietly- but then he grimaces, looks down.

They stay that way, Eiji frozen, looking down at...

“Some of it is,” Eiji says, at last.

 Fury rushes into his blood- and blind, staggering _fear._

 

 _Youwillnottakeawaymylastfamily_ -

 

(If Shorter has to look back, this was the real turning point- if he was afraid of Eiji, the new Eiji with blood on his face- it was nothing close to even thinking about losing him.)

He’s gotten to his feet. He’s not sure when he did.

 Eiji is tugging at his hand.

 

“Come on, we need to get out of here.”

 

•

 

Yut-Lung’s not sure when he’s last seen such fury and disgust on a little face.

 

It’s been a day for discoveries, certainly.

 

“ _You,_ ” the little ponytailed ruffian practically spits, anger coloring his cheeks. He looks like he’s square inches away from leaping at Yut-Lung and clawing his eyes out, much like... Eiji Okumura earlier, towards the other personnel. He looks nothing like the little demon from earlier, did Eiji- on the contrary, he had returned to his rather irritating, _Japanese_ self- looking nervously at his friend, to eager to not _displease._

 

But, well. His curiosity did pay off, in the most interesting way.

 

“And who are you?” Yut-Lung drawls. It serves to incite anger in the little beansprout, who actually growls at him. The nerve!

 

Eiji attempts to subtly restrain his friend, gripping onto his arm. He has a fake, pleasant smile on his face. “This... is Shorter.”

 

Shorter? Recollection tickles his memory- a bald man with sunglasses, threatening to kill an immobile Eiji in order to save him from a fate worse than death-

 

Well, well, well.

 

Quick as a snake, he swoops on the little ponytailed brat, and within moments, the boy falls unconscious, collapsing to the floor like a puppet with it’s strings cut.

 

Yut-Lung experimentally flexes his wrist. Maybe not quite the master he used to be, but more than enough to subdue an unruly child. Eiji is staring at him in shock, mouth open.

 

“Wipe your face, you look a fright.” Yut-Lung curtly instructs, annoyed. Slowly, Eiji wipes his face with a free hand, still trying to shield his unconscious friend from the floor. When he looks up at Yut-Lung, looking both afraid and defiant.

 

“We have friends I need to-“

 

“I am not a charity case, Eiji Okumura.” Yut-Lung interrupts, coldly. “I cannot take a merry band of hooligans. People would ask _questions._ ”

 

Eiji’s mouth thins.

 

“I can take you unconscious, too if you would prefer. It may even be preferable. Or would you like to be immobile, aware but unable to move? I’m sure it’ll bring back fond memories.”

 

Eiji looks down, and Yut-Lung knows he’s won. With a lifetime’s worth of practice, he restrains himself from showing any signs of gloating.

 

He snaps his fingers. “Drag him up, if you can.”

 

With clear reluctance, Eiji hauls his friend up, and props him up, with difficulty. His arms begin to tremble with the weight. Shorter Wong’s head lolls, limp.

 

With a grunt, Yut-Lung hauls the child up and places him on his shoulder. “I will arrange for _you_ to be _cleaned_. Now, hold my hand.”

 

The siren wails distantly in the background, insistent.

 

The three of them walk out into the crisp fall leaves and out of CORE, never to return.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you as always to my wonderful beta Moneera!! It’s a delight to talk to you. And thank you so much to everyone who keeps reading and commenting and leaving kudos!!! You guys are the BEST!! Let me know what you thought of this latest chapter down below... wink wink
> 
> HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!


	8. Volume One, Part Six

Eiji watches the sun rise over the clouds out of the window, staining the sky pink and gold.

Shorter has lapsed into a natural sleep beside him, gently snoring. Even Yut-Lung had fallen into a kind of sleep, the kind that a cat might have, light and aware, disturbed by the slightest movement. Eiji wonders if the man has always slept like that, if it was taught to him.

Ash slept terribly, with a name on his lips or waking up with a start- it’s a wonder sometimes, that Eiji could ever get him up in the morning. But the smiles were worth it, he thinks, and something clamps down in his heart like a vice.

Unbidden, he touches the window, reaching for the harbor and the sight of Lady Liberty, tiny in the distance.

Condensation frosts around Eiji’s fingertips, pressed into the glass. An indecipherable emotion rises in him, clenches the heart in his chest. Mingled guilt and relief chase each other, dragons both.

The golden sunrise stained the waters pink and dark purple, chasing the darkness into long shadows.

 

All nights, eternal as they felt, always came to an end.

 

“I’m coming home,” he whispers. _Ash._

 

•

Ash stares up at a cloudless, aquamarine-blue sky.

The grass rustles around him, gently blowing in the breeze- it’s the kind of peace he hasn’t had in a very, very long time. 

It had been a rough journey to even get where he was now. When he woke again, it... it was devastating.

 

_When Ash wakes, he’s staring at a concrete ceiling._

_This should be more alarming than it actually is, he distantly feels. Something is breathing, long and deep against him. He tries to roll over to have a look. Curiously, he’s not in pain anymore. Either he’s on some really good stuff, or- oh._  

_He stares, pretty taken aback. There’s a woman sleeping next to him on the floor, blond locks of hair rising and lowering with every breath she takes. Oh Christ. She’s enormous. No, wait. What? It’s like seeing from a dog’s perspective or something- like he’s small, very small._

_Panic starting to rise, he starts to cry. Not the silent kind of crying, the wailing sound that children make when they’re trying to talk, but can’t. Horrified, he tries to cover his mouth- oh god his hands are small, too._ No, _he realizes with a wave of horror. Where are his_ letters _?_

 _Eiji, he despairs, really beginning to wail. The letters, the plane ticket- they weren’t there. The woman wakes up, trying to soothe him._  

_He barely cares._

 

Ash deeply exhales. His mother, or whoever she was would be gone for hours at a time- and then, she hadn’t come back.

Desperate, he played dead. 

Stinking, filthy, he’d escaped from the garbage bin they’d thrown him in, and crawled. 

He’d done it, he thinks to himself grimly. He’d begged, stole- whatever it took, and held on to the hope of reuniting with Eiji with both hands. 

It had taken years of effort- nights where he looked down at his toddler body and cursed that the years felt like eternity. But he knew well enough the danger signs of prostitution, in the meantime and when he got suckered, drugged, he fought like a tiger and fled like a bat out of hell. _One_ lifetime was _enough_ , he thinks, fury misting over his vision. 

He couldn’t remember it all- a fine fog had settled over some further-back memories of his past life, but what he could remember from Blanca hammering into him, he did try to practice. Day in, day out- trying to build enough muscle to look like a short kid, versus a young one. 

His vocabulary helped with that- he stole a small-sized English dictionary one day from the store, and practiced like hell, training himself to the point where he could speak as he did once before.

The day he was old enough for a library card- that he could use without suspicion- he nearly cried. 

Knowledge was a safe haven. He’d dived in with relish into the stacks of books. He practiced calculus, algebra- the whole works. His brain, slow to start, had started running at a speed he was comfortable with once more. 

At least he was born with the same brainpower, he had thought with a mixed feeling in his stomach. Before, he hated anything that made him look special- but for the past years, people preferred him to be invisible, passing by him on the street as he begged for coins; they hadn’t the time to waste on the homeless, even the children-probably fearful that they’d get pickpocketed. Not a completely invalid fear, as Ash would think, stealing out of the pockets of the well-off looking businessmen, but it was certainly cruel.

Times had certainly changed. A new president was in power- a republican by the name of George W. Bush. 

He looked a little nicer than some of the folks Ash had seen in DC, he supposed, mulling over an abandoned, out-of-date New York Times. The world had rallied around him following the events of 9/11. (he remembered where he was, that day, huddled in back of a dumpster, watching the tv through the window of a bar.) Ash had shaken his head, examined the profile a little closer. 

A drinker, he deduced- broken capillaries went up and down the man’s nose. But yes, other than that, soft-looking.

Sharp, bespectacled eyes peered over the shoulder of the president. Ash smiled a little tightly: Ah, there it was. Interesting- very interesting. 

“Having fun lying there?” A familiar voice calls, startling Ash out of reverie.

Ash snorts, climbs to his feet, muscles pulsing with protest. With the ease of practice, he deftly ignores it. “Want to go again, old man?”

 

• 

It was surreal to be standing in the La Guardia Airport, to know that he was once more in New York City.

Eiji had never been- only to John F. Kennedy. 

It was _crowded_.

Yut-Lung’s grip on his shoulder is iron, immovable. No longer the sleeping cat, his face was distinctly draconian, carved of stone.

 

• 

Luciana sits under the spray of the tiny shower stall. Her clothes grew heavy on her, absorbing the water.

She barely notices.

They’d been collectively interrogated, all of her age group- and to her great relief, they had all passed the first interrogation.

They seemed to be under the impression, for now that it was the work of an older kid- which both baffled and relieved her. The two other boys had surprisingly held up under the first round of interrogation, looking confused and frightened as the rest of the other children.

It was easy to follow their lead, if only for a different reason.

The screams of the other children had haunted her into the wee hours of the morning- the writhing bodies, under her feet, outlines just visible in the dark-

When she had dreamed, she dreams that she had extended her hand. 

Her sobs were obscured by the sound of the running water. 

• 

Eiji’s not sure when he fell asleep, exactly. 

He blinks awake. White sheets meet his vision.

He’s... on a bed. How nice of Yut-Lung, showing hospitality, he thinks to himself, sleepily.

He turns his head on the pillow, and is met with the silently furious gaze of Shorter Wong.

“Oh, good. You’re awake.” Shorter snaps, baring his teeth. Eiji is taken aback by this unusual display of aggression towards him, and blinks. “Are... you okay?” He asks, timid. 

“Try move your arm,” Shorter commands, words coming out muffled through gritted teeth. Experimentally, Eiji tries to move. God, his hand is heavy. Something was lying against it. 

To his surprise, both of their hands rise together out of the sheet, handcuffs gleaming silver between the two of them. Shorter’s hand is in a very rude gesture, and surprised, Eiji laughs.

“It’s not that funny,” Shorter groans, although the laughter has seemed to defuse some of Shorter’s fury. He jerks his chin at Eiji. “Okay, try move your _other_ arm.”

Eiji... can’t. Experimentally, he tries to jiggle it, with limited success. 

“See?”

“What the hell is going on?” Eiji asks, confused, staring at the hand that wouldn’t move. When he looks back at Shorter, his friend was doing apt impression of a boiling teakettle.

“Well, I COULD’VE TOLD YOU _DIFFERENTLY_ , IF YOU AND THAT FASHIONISTA NUT-JOB DIDN’T _FUCKING_ KNOCK ME OUT, AND _CARRY_ _ME_ OUT LIKE A DISNEY PRINCESS!” 

Eiji cringes from the loud volume. He supposes that he deserved that: Apparently now they were in cuffs. There were no implications in this scenario that were very good. Regret suffused him; He had... gravely miscalculated, apparently.

“Enough,” a cold voice rings out over them.

Upon hearing, Shorter twists and _lunges_. A sickening _pop_ emanates from Eiji’s shoulder from the movement, and surprised, he howls.

Through the haze of pain, Eiji dimly registers Shorter spitting up at Yut-Lung’s face. “QÙ SÎ!”*

Calmly, Yut-Lung wipes his cheek with a silken sleeve. His smile is like the line of a razor, and Eiji shivers to see it, even while in pain.

 

“I’ve led you to your death once, Shorter Wong. I’m sure I can do it again, and much more... messily. But just as painful.”

“Cào nǐ zǔzōng shíbā dài!” Shorter screams at the older man, and Eiji cringes, gritting his teeth, trying not to cry. Telling the Lee family head that his family could fuck themselves to the eighteenth generation wasn’t exactly the height of diplomacy, even if it was well deserved.

Yut-Lung’s expression could be carved of marble.

 

A slap rings out across the room, and Shorter falls back to the bed, a bright red handprint blooming across his face- his nose, under his eyes.

“Mongrel.” Yut-Lung says, coldly, in English. Tears spring to Shorter’s eyes, but he glares steadily back at the Lee family head.

“You will both be fed. I will see you... in the morning.”

 

As the doors close, tears begin rolling down Shorter’s face.

The handprint is turning purple.

 

“Why did you bring me here, Eiji?” He croaks, and Eiji’s heart breaks for him, then and there.

No excuse feels good enough, anymore.

“I’m sorry,” Eiji murmurs into the top of Shorter’s head. I’m sorry.”

 

• 

Yut-Lung breathes out, slowly. A cup of jasmine tea sat on his mahogany desk, steam wafting and fragrancing the air around him.

 

He was the only one alive that knew of Eiji Okumura’s and Shorter Wong’s existence.

 

That was about to change.

•

 

“You get newspapers here?” Ash asks, skeptically.

Blanca rustles the paper, silent.

 **New York Times,** _October 01, 2004_ , it read.

**KERRY AND BUSH FACE OFF**

 

The two men glaring at each other from the front page, printed color. 

It was November already.

“Who do you think won?” The elections were held in early November- a week ago.

Blanca peers above the paper, expression inscrutable. His face had become lined, with the years.

“That’s not the question you should ask, Ash.”

Without a further word, he folds it, and passes Ash the newspaper.

 

•

 

Sing was having a rough day, he’d had to admit. It wasn’t easy, subduing the Corsican Mafia- tough little fuckers, thinking they could rise up and replace a man long dead.

With the fall of Dino Golzine, the Corsican Mafia, much like a chicken without it’s head, had run around in a panic and eventually died.

Still, it didn’t stop the occasional moron from thinking he could revive it. Not under Sing’s watch- not under the Lee family’s watch, he thinks, and breathes out a cloud into the cold air.

Christ, the harbor was cold.

 

He looks in vague disgust at the ship he stood on, and genuinely, not for the first time, wondered if he could get away with just dumping the potato sacks of cocaine for the fish to enjoy.

Probably would cause an epidemic in restaurant goers, he concludes, glumly. 

•

Ash pored over the newspaper. It was dark out, but for the light of the lamp.

• 

Luciana stares at the beans on her plate.

“Eat.” Ajit commands, gently shoving her. She doesn’t move.

Ajit doesn’t move, either for a long moment. The cafeteria, usually noisy, is subdued.

“I hear them too,” Ajit admits, at last. 

“Do you think—“ she draws in a deep breath, unable to finish. That Shorter and Eiji were down there? 

Another night had passed, with a new, horrifying addition- in the dream, Shorter is reaching to her in the dark, holding Eiji in the other hand, and the fire had consumed the three of them, charring their flesh from their bones.

 

Shorter had told them of the way to escape; likely had planned using it himself: and with their absence, the reality was sinking in- they’d all failed.

After all that happened, they had _failed_.

A sharp pain in her foot brings her out of her reverie. 

Ajit glares at her fiercely, and her foot throbs. “Stop it,” he bites out. “You can’t think that way.” 

A hot sob rises in her throat, strangling her.

• 

“Why are we here, Eiji?” Shorter asks, breaking the silence. They’d been force-fed gruel, earlier- the taste of the starch was rotting in Eiji’s mouth, souring it. (Eiji’s arm still hadn’t been set, though an apology had been made for it, a reluctant, if genuine one.) A bitter, acrid thing began to grow in Eiji’s stomach.

“I... sent a message.”

“You sent a _what_?”

 

Silence.

 

“How? We don’t have access to the outside world.”

“I had accelerated courses.”

Shorter grunts, a dubious sound. “Eiji, I don’t think they let you just because you’re advanced. CORE does a pretty good job of isolation.” 

Bile thickened in Eiji’s stomach; he clenches his eyes shut in the dark, trying to not remember just the lengths that CORE had done exactly that. He breaths out, slowly. He _had_ to get back to Luciana, Ajit and Tiny as soon as- He cuts that thought off. Later.

 

“Maybe they’ll have found out by now what I did. I don’t know. They were teaching us coding on their computers. I just used the instruction manual...” and went from there. 

“So you sent a message and didn’t tell me?”

“I wasn’t sure if he’d come.”

Silence fell again, heavier.

“I don’t really know a whole lot about computers, Eiji, but if you could do that, maybe you can disable this psychopath’s security system to let us go.”

 

•

Fear pulses through his veins. He couldn’t of possibly heard right. This was far worse than the worst outcome he could of ever imagined. 

“Please, no- Take me-“

“The wonderful thing about you two men is that not are you only easy to handle, but you’ll do anything not to see the other one hurt.” There is a cruel, thin smile on Yut-Lung’s face. “Forget what those Japanese dogs did to our families, did you?” He addresses Shorter, who bares his teeth in defiance. “I’m an American, Lee. And so is Eiji.” 

“He didn’t start that way. You still scrape and bow to him.”

“Shorter is my FRIEND!” Eiji bursts, angrily. 

“I know,” Yut-Lung replies, silky. “That’s why he’ll go first.” 

Eiji is a blur of motion.

There is another awful, audible popping sound, and a thin, high-pitched scream.

Shorter stares at him in horror. 

Eiji’s arm is hanging out of both of it’s joints, now- Eiji’s face has gone bloodless.

He grits his teeth, clearly determined to prevent further sounds of pain, and Yut-Lung bursts into laughter. “Oh, I wonder what Ash would think to see you now. It’s too bad that precious wonder boy isn’t here to see it.”

“You keep his name out of your mouth,” Eiji hisses out between his teeth. “You don’t have a right.” 

“I have every right. Unless you have the monopoly on a dead man’s name,” Yut-Lung returns, amused. He addresses Shorter: “If _you_ don’t play along, _I_ won’t send someone to set your friend’s arms.” 

“... I’ll play along with your lab rat shit, okay?” Shorter grounds out. “Get him a goddamn doctor.”

The amused look remains, though distinctly cools. 

Shorter’s face whips to the side from the force of the slap.

“Don’t presume to order _me_ around, brat.”

 

•

“Shorter- Shorter-“

“I’ll come back, Eiji. I promise.”

When Shorter is taken away, docile and without a fight, Eiji is weeping, but not from the pain.

“ _I’ll protect you,”_ Shorter Wong says, in a memory, sunglasses glinting in an overhead light as Eiji lies, paralyzed, pulse thudding in his ear with terror and fury both, helpless as a newborn. _“I swear it.”_

• 

Yut-Lung exhales deeply, looking through the glass of the examination room. A sea of emotions coursed through his stomach, looking at that little head on the doctor’s table. 

It was a rare thing indeed to find truly a specimen, a _real_ occurrence of reincarnation. It hadn’t occurred to him until he had truly seen the faces of men long dead, but then the possibilities had grown in him, sprouting like so many seeds, fed by the behavior and the knowledge of a dead man.

He was nearly certain, but he had to be _sure._  

Yut-Lung’s mind drifted: It was too bad that Eiji had been damaged, but it was fortunate for him that there was another subject to be observing.

Shorter Wong meant far less to him, and yet...

 

A surge of old emotions suffused the man, churning his stomach. Yut-Lung, uncharacteristically, hung his head.

It has been a long time since he had truly come face to face with such old emotions.

 

Briefly, with a flash of longing and pure grief, he lets himself wonder, really _wonder_ what it might mean, if in this life, he could find his mother.

 

Hadn’t he already imagined this, so long ago, lying in bed and letting himself think: _If only things were different, if he could only have her again?_

It was childish. But the thought had grabbed ahold of him, vice-like in it’s grip.

 

A lump rises in his throat.

 

_I want to do right by her._

 

In his mind’s eye, he watches her on the ground, gaze blank, a place far away from the atrocities happening to her.

Tears dripped slowly on green silk as he stood there with his head hung, staining it.

•

 

“What do you remember from your past life?” The old doctor says, lined face creasing with every word. Shorter scowls at him. He wasn’t getting dissected yet like a beetle on a board, but there wasn’t a way to avoid it, either, so he didn’t see much point in being polite to prolong the inevitable. From the frying pan, into the fire indeed.

“Everything,” he replies, with every ounce of derision he can pour into it. God, he wants to slap Eiji upside the head- except he’d already dislocated his friend’s arm. Guilt and rage toiled in him both, and he slowly exhales through his nose.

If only Eiji had stuck to the plan- alright, the plan he _obviously had no idea about,_ because it was cooked up in order to _save_ him. Christ, he hoped that those kids at CORE would be alright. They had left the place in shambles.

He _had_ to do something to help them. Of all the reckless, stupid-

 

The doctor’s eyebrows were raised, bushy and dark in his face. “I have your file. Tell me, Shorter Wong, who do you _think_ you are?”

 

Was this what Ash had to put up with, or something, being some kind of specimen for Dino to look at? Shorter thought, with mingled regret and irritation. “I _know_ I’m Shorter Wong, doc.” 

“Tell me something that only Shorter Wong would know.”

Oh, great. “I don’t know, that your boss posed as a jewish doctor’s adopted son when we first met?”

The pen stopped scribbling for a moment. Dark eyes out of the pouchy face raised to meet his own. “Go on.”

 

Shorter’s mouth twisted. _For Eiji,_ he reminded himself.

 

“Ash Lynx was my friend. I drove the van that your family provided to kill Dino Gonzales. He deserved a lot more than a bullet in the shoulder.”

•

 

Sing observed Yut-Lung’s face in the firelight. He’d come to give his weekly report to the mogul, but something felt off in the hooded eyes of the older man, gazing at a place, far, far away from them both, face in shadow from the fire.

 

The wine glinted in the dim light, thick and and red like blood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * Qu Si means literally “Drop Dead!” 
> 
> Thank you as always to my perfect af Moneera, who is so on the same page as me it’s a little scary sometimes. I love you. Alright, everyone- so what do you think? Our boys certainly have landed in it again...


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